THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


FROM  THE  LIBRARY  OF 
FRANK  J.  KLINGBERG 


n 
/7/ 


QUEEN  VlCl^ORIA. 


IN 


THE    NINETEENTH    CENTURY 


BY 


ELIZABETH   WORMELEY   LATIMER 

AUTHOR  OF  "FRANCE  IN  THE  NINETEENTH   CENTURY,"  "RUSSIA  AND 

TURKEY  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY,"   "FAMILIAR  TALKS 

ON  SOME  OF  SHAKESPEARE'S  COMEDIES,"  "THE  CHAIN 

OF  ERRORS,"   ''  PRINCESS  AMELIE,"   ETC. 


FOURTH     EDITION 


CHICAGO 

A.  C.  McCLURG   AND    COMPANY 
1897 


COPYRIGHT 

BY  A.  C.  MCCLURG  AND  Co, 
A.  D.  1894 


NOTE. 

IN  respect  to  my  "  France  in  the  Nineteenth  Century," 
and  "  Russia  and  Turkey  "  in  the  same  period,  I  have  some- 
times been  reminded  by  reviewers  —  most  kind  to  the 
books,  however,  as  readable,  amusing,  and  instructive  — 
that  I  was  not  an  historian  working  up  new  material  for  a 
definite  result. 

I  readily  accept  this  opinion  ;  I  have  no  desire  to  arro- 
gate to  myself  the  high  title  of  an  historian,  though,  to  a 
certain  extent,  all  history  must  be  compilation.  My  aim  has 
been  to  throw  flashes  of  light  on  events  which  during  my 
lifetime  have  interested  the  public ;  to  amuse,  and  now  and 
then  instruct,  the  "  general  reader."  Had  I  called  my  work 
"  Historical  Gossip,"  as  I  at  first  intended,  my  aim  and 
scope  in  writing  it  might  have  been  better  understood. 

Throughout  "  France  in  the  Nineteenth  Century "  there 
are  many  little  personal  reminiscences  of  my  life  in  Paris 
from  1839  to  1842,  and  again  in  1847  and  1848.  I  dis- 
guised these  in  the  third  person,  not  wishing  to  thrust  my 
personality  upon  my  readers.  In  the  present  volume  I  have 
done  otherwise,  and  have  made  use  of  family  and  personal 
reminiscences  as  far  as  they  would  serve. 

My  grandfather,  Captain  James  Wormeley,  being  in  1775 
a  student  at  William  and  Mary  College  in  Virginia,  was  dis- 
appointed in  a  love  affair,  and  ran  away  to  England.  There, 
by  the  influence  of  Bishop  Porteus,  —  then  Bishop  of  Ches- 
ter, and  afterwards  Bishop  of  London,  —  he  obtained  a  cap- 
taincy in  the  Stafford  Regiment,  at  that  time  serving  as  the 
king's  body-guard  at  Windsor.  He  remained  with  his  regi- 
ment till  1 785,  when  peace  had  ended  our  Revolutionary 


09*71 7 

/w/woJL  6    it 


iv  NOTE. 

War.  His  regiment  was  disbanded,  and  he  returned  to 
Virginia  with  his  wife,  —  the  lady  for  whose  sake  he  had 
left  his  friends  and  home. 

Twelve  years  later  he  was  importuned  to  return  to  his  old 
regiment;  his  wife  had  died,  and  he  pined  for  association 
with  his  old  comrades.  Taking  his  only  son,  my  father, 
Ralph  Randolph  Wormeley,  he  went  back  to  England,  and 
placed  his  boy  in  the  British  navy.  There  my  father  rose 
rapidly.  He  served  all  through  the  wars  of  Napoleon  in 
the  Mediterranean,  under  Sir  Robert  Calder,  Lord  St.  Vin- 
cent, Lord  Exmouth,  Sir  Charles  Cotton,  and  Lord  Colling- 
wood.  He  was  made  a  post-captain  in  1815,  and  became  a 
rear-admiral  in  1849,  — Just  fifty  years  after  ne  had  entered 
the  navy.  He  was  one  of  four  American-born  English 
admirals  in  this  century ;  Sir  Isaac  Coffin,  Sir  Benjamin 
Hallowell,  and  Sir  Jahleel  Brenton  being  the  others. 

In  1820  my  father  sought  a  wife  in  New  England,  Miss 
Caroline  Preble,  niece  of  Commodore  Edward  Preble,  one 
of  the  founders  of  the  American  navy.  Their  children  were 
all  brought  up  with  heads  and  hearts  full  of  American  tra- 
ditions. 

This  little  explanation  seemed  necessary  to  make  clear  to 
the  reader  a  few  things  in  my  narrative,  which  I  hope  may 
be  as  kindly  received  as  its  predecessors. 

E.  W.  L. 

HOWARD  COUNTY,  MARYLAND, 
September,  1894. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.    THE  YEAR  1822. — THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  9 
II.     GEORGE  IV.  —  MRS.  FITZHERBERT.  —  PRINCESS 

CHARLOTTE 45 

III.  LORD    CASTLEREAGH.  —  MR.  CANNING.  —  THE 

DUKE  OF  WELLINGTON 73 

IV.  THE  REFORM  BILL.  —  LORD  ALTHORP. — LORD 

BROUGHAM.  —  WILLIAM  COBBETT     ...  94 
V.    THE  ACCESSION  AND  CORONATION  OF  QUEEN 

VICTORIA.  —  LORD  MELBOURNE    ....  124 
VI.    MARRIAGE  OF  QUEEN  VICTORIA.— O'CONNELL 

AND  IRELAND 145 

VII.    THE  CABUL  MASSACRE 167 

VIII.    TEN  YEARS,  — 1841-1851 200 

IX.    THE  GREAT  EXHIBITION.  —  SIR  ROBERT  PEEL. 
—  THE  DUKE  OF  WELLINGTON.  —  BARON 

STOCKMAR 227 

X.    THE  INDIAN  MUTINY 254 

XL    THE  INDIAN  MUTINY  (Continued} 284 

XII.    DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE  CONSORT 317 

XIII.  LORD  BEACONSFIELD 343 

XIV.  THE  SECOND  CABUL  MASSACRE 373 

XV.    MR.  GLADSTONE 387 

XVI.    QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE  AND  HER  FAMILY  411 

INDEX 445 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS. 


QUEEN  VICTORIA Frontispiece 

KING  GEORGE  IV To  face  page  46 

MRS.    FlTZHERBERT 52 

PRINCESS  CHARLOTTE 70 

GEORGE  CANNING 80 

DUKE  OF  WELLINGTON 90 

KING  WILLIAM  IV 102 

QUEEN  VICTORIA  IN  HER  CORONATION  ROBES    .    .    .  124 

LORD  MELBOURNE 132 

LADY  CAROLINE  LAMB 138 

DUKE  OF  KENT 142 

DUCHESS  OF  KENT 146 

PRINCE  ALBERT,  AT  THE  TIME  OF  HIS  MARRIAGE  .    .  154 

GENERAL  SIR  HENRY  HAVELOCK 192 

SIR  ROBERT  PEEL 238 

SIR  JOHN  LAWRENCE 264 

SIR  COLIN  CAMPBELL  (LORD  CLYDE) 282 

SIR  JAMES  OUTRAM 302 

PRINCESS  ALICE 332 

LORD  BEACONSFIELD 360 

WILLIAM  E.  GLADSTONE 388 

PRINCESS  ROYAL  (AFTERWARDS  EMPRESS  OF  GERMANY)  416 
CROWN   PRINCE   FREDERICK   (AFTERWARDS   EMPEROR 

OF  GERMANY) 422 

PRINCE  OF  WALES 426 

PRINCESS  OF  WALES 430 

DUKE  OF  YORK 434 

DUCHESS  OF  YORK 438 


ENGLAND 


IN 


THE    NINETEENTH    CENTURY. 


CHAPTER    I. 

THE  YEAR    1 82 2. — THE    FAMILY   OF   GEORGE    in. 

E  Marquis  of  Londonderry,  better  known  to  the 
world  by  his  title  of  Lord  Castlereagh,  had  been 
prominent  in  English  politics  for  twenty-five  years.  He 
had  persistently  opposed  all  liberal  advancement,  all 
progressive  opinions.  He  was  succeeded  in  his  office  of 
Foreign  Secretary  by  Mr.  Canning,  under  whose  guiding 
influence  the  cabinet  of  Lord  Liverpool  seemed  to  adopt, 
in  foreign  affairs  at  least,  an  entirely  different  policy. 

I  was  born  in  the  summer  of  1822,  exactly  as  it  were  on 
the  summit  of  the  Great  Political  Divide,  the  old  policy  of 
repression  going  out,  and  the  new  policy  of  progress  com- 
ing in,  which  has  prevailed  in  England  from  1822  up  to 
this  time. 

I  came  into  a  world  governed  on  High  Tory  princi- 
ples, but  with  all  kinds  of  radicalism,  and  sympathy  for  the 
late  French  Revolution,  seething  beneath  the  surface  of 
society. 

Poor  George  III.  had  died  in  1820,  after  nine  years 
of  hopeless  insanity,  during  which  the  Prince  of  Wales 
had  been  Prince  Regent  of  his  kingdoms.  Mr.  Pitt,  who 
had  been  Prime  Minister  at  the  beginning  of  the  century, 
resigned  office  in  1801,  but  returned  to  it  in  1804,  when, 


10      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

but  for  the  opposition  of  the  King,  his  old  rival,  Mr.  Fox, 
would  have  formed  part  of  his  ministry.  Pitt  died  in  Jan- 
uary, 1806,  and  was  succeeded  by  the  ministry  of  All  the 
Talents,  in  which  Mr.  Fox  was  Foreign  Secretary.  Mr. 
Fox  on  coming  into  office  was  forced  to  adopt  his  prede- 
cessor's policy,  and  to  continue  the  war  with  Napoleon 
Bonaparte.  He  died,  however,  in  1806.  A  few  months 
later,  Mr.  Canning  became  Foreign  Secretary.  In  1809, 
having  unhappily  quarrelled  with  Lord  Castlereagh,  then 
Minister  of  War  in  the  same  cabinet,  whom  he  accused 
of  tardiness  in  supporting  English  generals  in  the  Pen- 
insular War,  a  celebrated  duel  took  place,  after  which 
both  combatants  resigned  their  cabinet  positions.  Lord 
Castlereagh  resumed  office  shortly  after,  but  Canning,  re- 
fusing to  serve  in  the  same  ministry,  would  only  accept, 
six  years  later,  the  office  of  President  of  the  Board  of 
Control.  This  he  resigned  in  1820,  at  the  time  of  the 
Queen's  trial ;  but  on  Lord  Castlereagh's  death,  in  August, 
1822,  he  was  again  made  Secretary  for  Foreign  Affairs,  and 
at  once  committed  England  to  a  liberal  and  enlightened 
foreign  policy.  "  No,"  he  said,  when  invited  by  the  Holy 
Alliance  to  crush  the  movement  for  constitutional  govern- 
ment in  Spain,  "  England  can't  help  at  that  game.  We  '11 
maintain  the  parcelling  out  of  Europe  by  the  Treaty  of 
Vienna,  though  we  don't  half  like  it ;  but  we  hold  every 
nation  to  be  free  to  do  as  it  likes  within  its  own  boun- 
daries, and  when  we  please  we  will  resist  any  attack  on 
this  freedom." 

In  France,  in  1822,  the  close  of  Louis  XVIII. 's  life 
was  made  uneasy  by  the  persistent  efforts  of  the  emigre 
nobility  to  restore  the  old  regime  in  France.  Prussia,  but 
for  the  assistance  she  had  afforded  the  Allied  Powers  in 
their  struggle  with  Napoleon,  would  have  been  but  of  small 
account  in  the  family  of  nations.  Italy,  which  had  favored 
Napoleon,  was  punished  by  being  placed,  directly  or  indi- 
rectly, under  the  dominion  of  the  Austrians.  Russia  was 
under  the  Emperor  Alexander,  who  was  restrained  by  a 
conscientious  adherence  to  what  he  considered  the  prin- 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  \\ 

ciples  of  the  Holy  Alliance  from  taking  advantage  of  an 
opportunity  offered  him  of  acquiring  supreme  influence,  if 
not  absolute  dominion,  in  Constantinople  as  the  champion 
and  protector  of  the  revolted  Greeks.  Spain,  under  a  weak 
and  hated  sovereign,  King  Ferdinand,  was  incurring  the 
enmity  of  the  Powers  who  composed  the  Holy  Alliance,  by 
making  frantic  efforts  to  secure  a  constitution,  and,  a  year 
later  (1823),  was  to  be  invaded  by  French  troops,  in  order 
to  check  her  tendencies  towards  liberalism. 

England  when  I  was  born  had  made  very  little  material 
progress  since  the  age  of  Queen  Elizabeth.  It  prided  itself, 
indeed,  on  its  macadamized  roads,  its  canal-boats,  and  its 
fast  stage-coaches,  and  steamboats  were  beginning  to  be 
used  on  Scotch  and  English  rivers;  but  in  1822  the  steam- 
boats in  Great  Britain  numbered  only  a  hundred  and  twenty- 
three,  and  these  dared  not  venture  on  the  rough  waters  of 
the  ocean. 

Large  cities  were  beginning  to  be  lighted  with  gas.  The 
discovery  of  its  illuminating  powers  was  very  recent,  and 
the  smell  was  too  offensive  to  allow  of  its  introduction  into 
private  houses.  Boston,  one  of  the  earliest  American  cities 
to  introduce  it  into  its  streets,  did  not  adopt  it  till  1828. 

In  1822  Ohio  represented  our  Far  West.  A  quarter  of 
a  century  earlier,  Indians  had  tortured  white  men  to  death 
on  the  banks  of  the  Miami  River. 

Gutta-percha  was  a  substance  not  yet  applied  to  common 
uses.  India-rubber  overshoes  were  made  for  sale  by  Indians, 
who  ran  the  sap  into  rough  clay  moulds.  Stationers  kept 
rubber  shoes  in  those  days  to  cut  up  for  school  children 
who  wanted  to  buy  little  bits  of  India-rubber  to  obliterate 
pencil- marks.  Elastic  was  not ;  china  buttons  were  not. 
Shirt-buttons  looked  like  Queen  Mab's  chariot- wheels,  tiny 
constructions  made  of  thread  and  wire.  Our  nurse  lighted 
our  nursery  fire  with  tinder-box,  flint,  and  steel.  Innocu- 
lation  had  but  recently  given  place  to  vaccination ;  and 
many  faces  pitted  all  over  from  small-pox  might  be  met  in 
any  city  in  half-an-hour's  walk  through  the  streets.  In 
common  surgical  practice  there  were  no  alleviations  to  pain. 


12      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

In  the  summer  of  1815  my  father  crossed  the  ocean  on  a 
ship  that  had  on  board  the  New  York  dentist,  Dr.  Parmlee, 
who  had  been  to  Paris  to  learn  how  to  make  artificial  teeth. 
Before  that  time,  if  any  man  (like  General  Washington) 
wanted  a  new  set  of  teeth,  he  had  to  reconcile  himself  to 
adopting  those  of  a  dead  man. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  were  giants  on  the  earth  in 
those  days  in  statesmanship  and  literature.  Sir  Walter  Scott 
was  bravely  producing  Waverley  novels  as  fast  as  pen  could 
write  them,  in  his  grand  struggle  against  debt,  prompted  by 
his  keen  dread  of  mercantile  dishonor.  Byron  in  1822  was 
in  Venice,  and  had  just  published  "  Cain,"  as  a  defiance  to 
steady-going  humanity;  Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  Southey, 
Lamb,  Campbell,  De  Quincy,  and  Professor  Wilson  were 
in  their  noontide  glory. 

On  the  Continent,  great  authors  had  not  yet  shown  them- . 
selves.  The  turbid  waters  of  revolution  had  hardly  subsided 
enough  to  let  them  rise.  Goethe,  indeed,  was  living,  though, 
as  a  writer,  he  belongs  rather  to  the  last  years  of  the  eight- 
eenth century.  Although  America  had  Washington  Irving, 
her  literature  was  as  yet  only  an  annex  to  that  of  the  mother- 
country.  She  raised  little  cotton  ;  she  hardly  manufactured 
any  cotton  cloth ;  she  printed  none.  Power-looms  had, 
even  in  England,  not  entirely  superseded  the  ancient  hand- 
looms,  on  which  weavers  in  their  own  cottages  wove  their 
webs.  Workmen  were  bitterly  opposed  to  the  introduction 
of  machinery,  not  foreseeing  that  the  increase  of  produc- 
tion would  give  employment  to  hundreds  where  one  would 
have  got  a  living  under  the  old  system.  How  far  large 
factories,  with  their  armies  of  working-men  and  working- 
women,  would  be  conducive  to  morality,  breaking  as  they 
do  into  the  home  life  of  the  working-classes,  was  a  matter 
that  in  those  days  did  not  trouble  the  public  conscience 
at  all. 

Postage  was  a  very  heavy  tax  on  those  who  could  least 
afford  to  pay  for  letters;  for  the  better  class  of  society 
people  in  England  avoided  postage,  through  their  ac- 
quaintance with  peers  or  members  of  Parliament ;  and  the 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  13 

franking  privilege  afforded  those  gentlemen  a  cheap  and 
easy  way  of  gratifying  constituents,  and  bestowing  favors 
upon  friends. 

In  1822,  High  Churchism,  as  we  know  it  now,  or  as  it 
was  in  the  days  of  Laud,  was  out  of  date  in  England. 
Wesley  and  his  followers,  half  a  century  earlier,  had  run 
a  furrow,  as  it  were,  over  English  soil,  whence  had  started 
new  life  into  the  English  Church,  called  Evangelicalism. 
The  clergy  were  divided  into  high  and  dry  divines  of 
the  old  solid  school,  and  the  zealous,  enthusiastic,  rash, 
and  somewhat  contracted  Evangelicals,  who  claimed  a 
monoply  of  "  Gospel  teaching."  Among  the  lay  leaders 
of  the  Evangelical  party  were  Zachary  Macaulay  (father 
of  the  statesman,  poet,  and  historian),  Lord  Ashley, 
of  whom  I  shall  have  more  to  say  hereafter,  and  Mr. 
Wilberforce. 

Bishops  in  England  always  wore  wigs,  as  well  as  knee- 
breeches,  black  silk  stockings,  shovel  hats,  and  the  episco- 
pal apron ;  and  when  a  young  bishop  with  a  fine  head  of 
hair  was  persuaded  by  his  wife  to  request  the  Prince  Regent's 
permission  to  appear  at  court  without  his  wig,  many  persons 
—  especially  the  Duke  of  Cumberland  —  predicted  from 
such  an  innovation  the  downfall  of  the  Church,  —  much 
as  the  Court  Chamberlain  of  Louis  XVI.  predicted  the  over- 
throw of  monarchy  when  he  saw  shoe-strings  instead  of 
buckles  in  M.  Roland's  shoes. 

There  was  no  system  of  government  education  at  that 
time  in  England.  The  education  of  the  poor  was  the  work 
of  private  charity.  There  was  a  Poor  Law,  which  obliged 
ratepayers  to  support  paupers ;  and  sometimes  the  poor- 
rate  became  so  grievous  that  it  swallowed  up  the  profits  of 
the  farmer  and  made  him  poor.  He  had  to  pay,  besides 
tithes  and  church-rates  (the  latter  for  keeping  church  prop- 
erty in  order),  window  tax  for  every  window,  taxes  on  his 
horses  if  above  the  size  of  ponies,  taxes  on  his  cart-wheels, 
taxes  on  malt,  taxes  on  silver  plate,  if  he  had  any,  taxes  on 
hair-powder,  if  he  wore  it,  taxes  on  property,  if  he  inherited 
it,  and  taxes  on  every  bill  he  paid,  for  no  receipt  for  any  sum 


14      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

above  £10  was  legally  valid,  unless  it  were  written  upon 
stamped  paper. 

Sydney  Smith's  celebrated  denunciation  of  taxation  at 
that  period  (which  my  father  made  me  learn  by  heart  when 
I  was  seven  years  old)  was  no  exaggeration. 

"  We  have,"  he  says,  "  taxes  upon  every  article  that  enters 
into  the  mouth,  or  covers  the  back,  or  is  placed  under  the  foot ; 
taxes  upon  everything  which  it  is  pleasant  to  fee),  smell,  or 
taste ;  taxes  on  everything  in  the  earth,  or  in  the  waters  under 
the  earth ;  on  everything  that  comes  from  abroad  or  that  is 
grown  at  home  ;  taxes  on  the  raw  material ;  taxes  on  every 
value  that  is  added  to  it  by  the  industry  of  man  ;  taxes  on  the 
sauce  which  pampers  man's  appetite,  and  on  the  drug  which 
restores  him  to  health  ;  on  the  ermine  which  covers  the  judge, 
and  the  rope  that  hangs  the  criminal ;  on  the  poor  man's  salt, 
and  the  rich  man's  spice ;  on  the  brass  nails  of  the  coffin,  and 
the  ribbons  of  the  bride; — on  bed  and  board  —  couchant  or 
levant  —  we  must  pay.  The  schoolboy  whips  his  taxed  top; 
the  beardless  youth  manages  a  taxed  horse,  with  a  taxed  bridle, 
on  a  taxed  road;  and  the  dying  Englishman,  pouring  his  medi- 
cine, which  has  paid  seven  per  cent,  into  a  spoon  \vhich  has  paid 
fifteen  per  cent,  flings  himself  back  upon  his  chintz  bed,  which 
has  paid  twenty-two  per  cent,  and  expires  in  the  arms  of  an 
apothecary  who  has  paid  a  license  of  one  hundred  pounds  for 
the  privilege  of  presiding  at  his  death-bed.  His  whole  prop- 
erty is  then  taxed  from  two  to  twenty  per  cent.  Besides  the 
probate,  large  fees  are  demanded  for  burying  him  in  the  chan- 
cel ;  his  virtues  are  handed  down  to  posterity  on  taxed  marble, 
and  he  is  gathered  to  his  fathers  to  be  taxed  no  more." 

This  excessive  taxation  was  mainly  the  result  of  the  vast 
efforts  made  by  England  in  her  wars  with  Napoleon.  Many 
persons  believed  (like  Lord  Holland)  that  Napoleon  might 
probably  have  been  quiet,  had  he  been  let  alone,  and  con- 
sidered the  wars  against  him  as  undertaken  solely  in  the 
interest  of  kings  and  of  the  aristocracy.  As  time  develops 
more  and  more  the  inner  history  of  Napoleon's  career,  it 
may  be  doubted  whether  he  ever  could  or  would  have 
adopted  the  motto  of  his  nephew,  "The  Empire  is  peace," 
for  more  than  a  few  years  at  a  time.  There  was  deep 
discontent  in  England  from  1818  to  1822,  which  Lord 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  15 

Castlereagh  put  down  with  a  firm  hand.  His  domestic 
government  was  stern,  rigid,  and  persecuting.  His  foreign 
policy  appeared  to  countenance  every  encroachment  on 
the  rights  of  nations  attempted  by  the  sovereigns  of  Europe. 
He  shot  himself  in  August,  1822,  and  popular  hatred  dis- 
turbed his  funeral  ceremonies  as  he  was  laid  to  his  last  rest 
in  Westminster  Abbey. 

In  our  own  day  we  sometimes  talk  of  being  tired  of 
Dickens's  maudlin  sympathies  and  sentimentalities ;  but  to 
estimate  what  the  world  was  before  the  days  of  Dickens  we 
must  look  back  to  the  state  of  public  sentiment  upon  the 
subjects  on  which  he  wrote,  in  my  earlier  days. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  last  century  a  son  of  Lord  Mon- 
tagu had  been  stolen,  sold  to  a  sweep- master,  and  used  as  a 
chimney-sweep.  Being  sent  to  sweep  the  chimneys  in  his 
father's  house,  he  entered  his  mother's  chamber,  and  recog- 
nized his  surroundings.  This  led  to  his  being  restored  to 
his  family ;  and  in  grateful  remembrance  of  his  deliverance 
from  suffering  he  gave,  as  long  as  he  lived,  an  annual  feast 
to  all  the  London  chimney-sweeps  upon  the  ist  of  May. 
On  his  death,  Mr.  James  White  (Charles  Lamb's  friend) 
undertook  to  continue  the  festival ;  but  it  was  the  sole  gala 
day  in  the  year  for  these  unhappy  boys.  Such  horrors 
as  they  suffered  do  not  exist  now,  either  in  chimneys,  or  in 
factories,  or  workhouses,  or  Yorkshire  schools ;  and  this 
is  largely  because  Dickens  has  turned  the  full  light  of  pub- 
lic sympathy  upon  the  world's  dark  places  of  cruelty. 

Sydney  Smith  says,  — 

"  An  excellent  and  well-managed  dinner  is  a  most  pleasing 
occurrence,  and  a  geat  triumph  of  civilized  life.  It  is  not  only 
the  descending  morsel  and  the  enveloping  sauce,  but  the  rank, 
wealth,  beauty,  and  wit  which  savors  the  meats,  the  learned 
management  of  light  and  heat,  the  silent  and  rapid  services  of 
the  attendants,  the  smiling,  sedulous  host  proffering  gusts  and 
relishes,  the  exotic  bottles,  the  embossed  plate,  the  pleasant 
remarks,  the  handsome  dresses,  the  cunning  artifices  in  fruit 
and  farina;  — the  hour  of  dinner,  in  short,  includes  everything 
of  sensual  and  intellectual  gratification  which  a  great  nation 
glories  in  producing  In  the  midst  of  all  this,  who  knows  that 


1 6     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

the  kitchen  chimney  caught  fire  half-an-hour  before  dinner,  and 
that  a  poor  little  wretch  of  six  or  seven  years  old  was  sent  up 
in  the  midst  of  the  flames  to  put  it  out  !  There  is  a  positive 
prohibition  of  sending  boys  up  a  chimney  in  a  blaze ;  but  what 
matter  Acts  of  Parliament  where  the  pleasures  of  genteel  people 
are  concerned  ?  —  or  what  is  a  toasted  child,  compared  to  the  ago- 
nies of  the  mistress  of  the  house  with  a  deranged  dinner?" 

He  adds  further  :  — 

"  When  these  boys  outgrow  the  power  of  going  up  a  chim- 
ney, they  are  fit  for  nothing  else.  The  miseries  that  they  have 
suffered  lead  to  nothing ;  they  are  not  only  enormous,  but 
unprofitable.  Having  suffered  in  infancy  every  misery  that  can 
be  suffered,  they  are  then  cast  out  to  rob  and  thieve,  and  are 
given  up  to  the  law." 

I  have  spoken  only  of  the  chimney-sweeps,  but  the  mis- 
eries suffered  by  young  children  in  mines  and  factories  were 
as  great,  if  not  so  brutal ;  and  in  this  connection  I  may  say 
a  few  words  about  a  great  and  good  man  who  came  into 
Parliament  at  this  period.  He  was  born  Lord  Ashley,  he 
became  the  Earl  of  Shaftesbury.  He  by  no  means  belonged 
to  a  pious  or  exemplary  family.  His  religious  impressions 
were  taken  from  a  good  old  nurse  who  died  when  he  was 
seven  years  old.  "  The  recollection  of  what  she  said  and 
did  and  taught,"  he  has  remarked,  "  even  to  a  prayer  that  I 
now  constantly  use,  is  as  vivid  as  in  the  old  days  when  I 
heard  her.  I  must  trace,  under  God,  very  much,  perhaps 
all,  of  the  duties  of  my  later  life  to  her  precepts  and  her 
prayers." 

The  "duties"  he  thus  speaks  of  were  undertaken  to  pro- 
mote love  to  God  and  goodwill  towards  men,  especially 
towards  little  children.  I  have  heard  him  speak  upon  such 
subjects  at  public  meetings  in  Exeter  Hall.  He  was  a  tall, 
fair-haired,  slender,  eager-looking  man,  careless  in  dress, 
but  fervent  in  spirit.  The  House  of  Commons  from  1822 
to  1826  was  full  of  great  orators,  —  Canning,  who  died  in 
1827;  Brougham,  versatile,  brilliant,  and  omniscient;  Peel, 
the  great  debater ;  Huskisson,  the  master  of  facts ;  VVilber- 
force,  with  all  the  eloquence  of  conviction  and  persuasion. 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  17 

What  Wilberforce  had  done  towards  emancipating  blacks, 
Lord  Ashley  set  himself  to  do  for  factory  children. 

Factories  in  1822  were  a  new  invention.  Up  to  the  last 
quarter  of  the  eighteenth  century,  linen,  stockings,  and 
woollen  cloth  had  been,  as  I  have  said,  woven  in  hand- 
looms  by  weavers  who,  like  Silas  Marner,  dwelt  in  their 
own  cottages.  Their  webs  of  linen  were  laid  to  bleach 
upon  the  grass,  or  spread  upon  the  hedges.  The  pun- 
ishment was  death  for  the  Autolycus  who  filched  them  in 
the  gloaming. 

Edward  Cartwright  about  1785  invented  the  power-loom. 
This  led  almost  immediately  to  great  industry  in  the  manu- 
facture of  cotton  cloth.  Factories  were  established,  modern 
competition  began ;  and  when  hard  times  arrived,  manu- 
facturers, anxious  to  produce  cheap  goods,  threw  men  out 
of  employment,  and  took  on  women,  and  children  of  tender 
age,  to  tend  their  looms.  Then,  too,  in  the  year  1825  there 
came  in  England  a  "  commercial  crisis."  Banks  suspended 
payment  in  all  directions,  and  as  the  notes  of  country  banks 
circulated  almost  exclusively  in  the  communities  around 
them,  ruin  was  wide-spread  in  many  country  towns. 

The  great  reform  with  which  Lord  Ashley's  name  is  asso- 
ciated was  his  protest  against  employing  child-labor  in  the 
mills.  So  great  was  the  new  demand  for  this  cheap  labor 
that  London  guardians  of  the  poor  were  willing  to  supply 
small  pauper  boys  and  girls  out  of  their  workhouses  to  mill- 
owners,  and  despatched  them  by  the  bargeful  to  manufac- 
turing towns.  These  friendless  creatures,  overworked  and 
ill-treated,  died  rapidly,  or  became  lifelong  cripples. 

"  The  factories  were  rilled  with  women  and  children  working 
long  weary  hours  in  a  polluted  atmosphere,  standing  all  day 
on  their  feet  at  their  monotonous  labor.  Under  this  cheap  labor 
system  a  curious  inversion  of  the  rules  of  life  took  place.  Wo- 
men and  children  superseded  men  in  the  factories,  and  the 
domestic  concerns  of  the  family  were  attended  to  by  shiftless 
men,  or,  mother,  and  father  too,  lived  on  the  killing  labor  of 
their  little  children,  to  the  utter  destruction  of  parental  affection, 
and  of  the  last  remnants  of  self-respect." 

2 


1 8      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Heartbreaking  stories  were  published,  in  what  are  called 
Blue  Books,  —  /.  e.,  reports  of  Parliamentary  Commissions, 
—  about  children  so  weary  from  their  work  that  the  most 
inhuman  devices  were  resorted  to  by  their  mothers  to 
rouse  them  in  the  mornings. 

Southey,  under  date  of  1833,  wrote  of  Lord  Ashley  and 
the  child-labor  system  :  — 

"  The  slave  trade  is  nothing  to  it.  ...  Once  more  I  say, 
'  Cry  aloud,  and  spare  not.'  These  are  not  times  to  be  silent. 
Lord  Ashley  has  taken  up  the  Factory  Question  with  all  his 
heart,  and  with  a  deep  religious  sense  of  duty.  If  we  are  to  be 
saved,  it  will  be  —  I  do  not  say  by  such  men,  but  for  the  sake 
of  such  men  as  he  is." 

I  will  not  dwell  on  Lord  Ashley's  further  efforts  on  behalf 
of  children  made  to  work  in  coal-mines.  In  South  Stafford- 
shire, according  to  his  speech  in  Parliament,  it  was  common 
for  children  to  begin  work  at  seven  years  old.  "  In  the 
West  Riding  of  Yorkshire,"  he  said,  "  it  is  not  unusual  for 
infants  even  of  five  years  old  to  be  sent  to  the  pits.  Near 
Oldham,  children  are  worked  as  low  as  four  years  old,  and 
in  the  small  collieries  towards  the  hills,  some  are  so  young 
that  they  are  brought  to  work  in  their  bed-gowns."  This 
"  work "  was  dragging  sledge-tubs,  on  all  fours,  through 
tunnels  too  low  and  narrow  to  admit  grown  persons.  The 
child  had  a  girdle  fixed  about  its  waist,  to  which  the  sledge- 
tub  was  made  fast  by  a  chain. 

It  took  nearly  twenty  years  from  the  first  agitation  of  this 
subject  before  these  abuses  were  effectually  remedied  by  Act 
of  Parliament.  The  greatest  struggle  was  to  obtain  a  law 
permitting  only  ten  hours'  work  for  women  and  children. 
Miss  Barrett's  noble  poem,  "  The  Cry  of  the  Children,"  is 
said  to  have  had  a  powerful  influence  on  the  result. 

At  this  time  there  was  another  noble  work,  taken  up 
quietly  and  carried  on  successfully,  by  a  woman  whose  name 
will  be  handed  down  to  posterity  as  that  of  a  "  mother  in 
Israel." 

Elizabeth  Fry  was  a  Miss  Gurney,  one  of  the  rich  and 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  19 

influential  Quakers  of  that  name,  —  a  family  whose  happi- 
ness it  still  is  to  do  good. 

Her  mother  died  when  she  was  twelve  years  old,  and  her 
father,  self-absorbed,  paid  little  heed  to  the  seven  lovely 
daughters  who,  on  his  country  place  near  Norwich,  were 
growing  up  around  him. 

Elizabeth  was  the  gayest  of  the  band!  She  had  those 
bounding  high  spirits  which,  overpowering  in  youth,  are 
sometimes  the  salt  that  keeps  men  and  women  fresh  into 
old  age.  A  very  un-Quaker-like  young  lady  she  must  have 
been,  doting  on  dancing,  charmed  with  her  own  powers  of 
enchanting  gentlemen,  quick,  imaginative,  eager  for  excite- 
ment, and  admired  and  beloved  wherever  she  appeared. 

"  How  amazing  it  must  have  seemed  in  after-life,"  writes 
one  of  her  biographers,  "  to  the  calm,  serene,  holy-minded 
woman,  invincible  to  the  flatteries  of  courtiers,  the  friend- 
ship of  kings  and  emperors,  the  tears  of  empresses,  the 
shouts  and  blessings  of  excited  crowds,  unmoved,  save  to 
deepest  humility,  by  all  the  homage,  the  adulation,  the  al- 
most adoration  she  met  with  when  her  name  was  ringing 
throughout  Europe,  to  recall  how  in  her  butterfly  youth  the 
fripperies  of  a  ball-room  could  have  been  '  too  much '  for 
her,  and  singing  at  a  village  concert  might,  she  feared,  '  be 
a  snare.'  " 

When  about  eighteen  she  was  suddenly  startled  out  of  her 
gay  carelessness  by  a  sermon  heard  at  a  Quaker  meeting ; 
and  by  degrees  she  came  to  the  fixed  resolve  of  becoming 
what  her  sect  called  "  a  plain  "  Quaker.  Not  long  after  her 
adoption  of  the  Quaker  speech  and  dress,  she  married 
Joseph  Fry,  a  young  man  of  a  family  far  stricter  than  the 
Gurneys,  and  went  to  lead  the  life  of  a  London  merchant's 
wife  in  the  heart  of  the  City. 

It  is  a  mystery  to  many  not  connected  with  the  Society  of 
Friends  how  ladies  of  that  Society  contrive  to  do  the  work 
they  do  in  furtherance  of  schemes  of  benevolence  outside 
of  their  own  homes,  and  yet  maintain  their  domestic  estab- 
lishments in  perfect  order  and  dignity.  We  account  for  it 
on  the  supposition  that  Quaker  domestic  establishments  have 


2O     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

their  wheels  so  well  greased  by  wealth,  discipline,  and  kind- 
liness that  all  things  run  on  smoothly,  even  in  the  absence  of 
the  guiding  hand. 

At  first  Elizabeth  wrote  of  herself,  "  My  time  appears  to 
be  spent  to  little  more  purpose  than  eating,  drinking,  sleep- 
ing, and  clothing  myself."  But  she  had  at  all  times  a  house 
full  of  company,  and  her  large  family  of  children  came  in 
rapid  succession.  Moreover,  she  suffered  greatly  from  neu- 
ralgia, or,  as  she,  in  her  ignorance  of  our  modern  long  word, 
calls  it,  "  from  toothache."  But  by  chance  one  day  she  paid 
a  visit  with  a  friend  to  the  great  prison  at  Newgate. 

In  four  rooms,  not  over  large,  they  found  crowded  three 
hundred  women,  many  of  them  having  with  them  their 
children,  some  tried,  and  others  untried,  with  only  one  man 
and  one  woman  to  take  charge  of  them  by  night  and  day. 
Though  military  sentinels  were  posted  on  the  roof,  such  was 
the  prevailing  lawlessness  among  these  women  that  the 
Governor  of  the  Prison  entered  that  department  with  re- 
luctance, and  advised  the  ladies  to  lay  aside  their  watches 
before  going  in. 

Mrs.  Fry's  heart  was  touched.  She  sent  the  miserable 
creatures  clothes ;  but  four  years  passed  before  she  entered 
on  the  work  with  which  her  name  is  associated.  It  was  in 
the  midst  of  the  bitter  winter  of  1816,  when  the  Thames 
was  frozen  over,  and  a  fire  kindled  on  the  ice  roasted  an  ox 
whole,  that  Mrs.  Fry,  left  alone  at  her  own  desire  with  these 
women,  knelt  among  them  and  prayed  for  their  little  chil- 
dren, —  those  half-naked  and  half-starved  little  children  who 
stood  around  her.  Then,  having  won  the  women's  sym- 
pathy, she  proposed  to  open  a  school  for  these  little  ones. 
One  of  the  women  was  chosen  superintendent ;  and  thus 
began  that  movement  which  has  led  to  the  astonishing  ame- 
lioration of  prison  life  all  over  the  world. 

Here  is  a  description  of  the  Women's  Department  in 
Newgate  as  Mrs.  Fry  found  it,  written  by  one  of  her 
friends  :  — 

"  The  railing  was  crowded  with  half-naked  women  struggling 
together  for  the  front  situation  with  the  most  boisterous  violence, 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  2£ 

and  begging  with  the  utmost  vociferation.  I  felt  as  if  I  were 
going  into  a  den  of  wild  beasts,  and  shuddered  when  the  door 
closed  upon  me." 

In  a  fortnight  a  great  change,  at  least  in  outward  appear- 
ance, had  come  over  the  wards.  The  most  depraved  had 
recovered  some  self-respect. 

In  those  days  the  offences  for  which  people  were  hanged 
were  very  numerous.  Forgery,  passing  counterfeit  money, 
and  even  some  kinds  of  petty  theft,  were  capital  crimes. 
One  terrible  duty  was  undertaken  by  Mrs.  Fry,  —  that  of 
seeing,  advising,  and  comforting  condemned  prisoners  ;  and 
her  stories  of  these  poor  creatures,  some  of  whom  went  out 
of  their  minds  as  they  contemplated  the  horrors  of  their 
execution,  are  harrowing. 

One  woman,  for  having  passed  counterfeit  notes  received 
from  her  lover  (not  knowing  that  they  were  counterfeited), 
was,  in  1818,  condemned  to  the  gallows.  Mrs.  Fry  exerted 
herself  to  obtain  a  pardon  for  her.  In  vain  the  Duke  of 
Gloucester,  stupid  but  kindly,  used  his  influence  with  the 
Prime  Minister ;  the  poor  woman  was  executed.  Her  fate 
led  to  Mrs.  Fry's  introduction  to  the  old  Queen  Charlotte, 
who  was  paying  a  state  visit  to  the  Lord  Mayor.  Hearing 
that  Mrs.  Fry  was  in  the  Mansion  House  (whither  she  had 
come  to  make  interest  on  behalf  of  this  poor  woman),  the 
Queen  desired  to  see  her.  "A  murmur  of  applause,"  says 
a  spectator,  "  ran  through  all  the  assemblage  as  the  Queen 
took  Mrs.  Fry  by  the  hand.  The  murmur  was  followed  by 
a  clapping  and  a  shout,  which  was  taken  up  by  the  multitude 
without,  till  it  died  away  in  the  distance." 

This  visit  to  the  Lord  Mayor  was  Queen  Charlotte's  last 
appearance  in  public.  She  caught  cold  on  this  occasion, 
and  died  not  very  long  after. 

Soon  Mrs.  Fry  began  to  be  consulted  even  by  foreign 
nations  as  to  the  management  of  prisons.  In  spite  of  her 
numerous  children,  she  undertook  many  journeys  of  benevo- 
lence, always  accompanied  by  her  brother,  Joseph  John 
Gurney,  who  in  such  matters  went  with  her  heart  and 
hand. 


22      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

During  a  great  part  of  her  life  she  was  very  rich ;  but  in 
her  later  days  sorrows,  domestic  and  pecuniary,  came  upon 
her.  Her  husband's  business  house  was  involved  by  the 
failure  of  other  houses,  and  she  had  to  move  into  a  cottage, 
giving  up  her  beautiful  home.  It  also  grieved  her  that  her 
children  all  married  out  of  the  Quaker  connection.  Her 
eldest  grandchild  was  born  on  the  same  day  as  her  own 
youngest  child. 

In  her  earlier  days  she  was  frequently  sent  for  by  the 
Duchess  of  Kent  to  visit  the  little  Princess  Victoria,  whom 
she  describes  as  "  a  sweet,  lovely,  hopeful  child  ;  "  and,  later, 
she  records  long  conversations  on  prison  discipline  with 
Prince  Albert. 

The  King  of  Prussia,  when  he  visited  England  in  1842 
for  the  christening  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  insisted  upon 
taking  an  informal  luncheon  at  her  cottage.  On  this  occasion 
she  presented  to  him  eight  daughters  and  daughters-in-law, 
seven  sons  and  sons-in  law,  and  twenty-five  grandchildren. 
"  Her  life,"  says  Mrs.  Oliphant,  "  stands  nearly  alone  in  the 
boundless  and  almost  uninterrupted  success  which  attended 
every  effort." 

Her  end  was  gradual  and  peaceful.  The  naturally  frail 
tenement  failed,  worn  out  by  ceaseless  exertions,  at  the  age 
of  sixty-five.  She  died  at  Ramsgate,  October,  1845.  In 
the  garden  of  a  cottage  where  she  passed  the  last  years  of 
her  life,  a  Memorial  Church  has  been  erected,  the  corner- 
stone of  which  was  laid  by  Princess  Louise. 

"  The  key  to  her  whole  character,"  says  Mrs.  Oliphant, 
"  may  be  found  in  these  words,  written  for  her  sister  by 
her  own  pen  :  '  My  dear  Rachel,  I  can  say  one  thing,  since 
my  heart  was  touched  at  seventeen,  I  believe  I  have 
never  awakened  from  sleep,  in  sickness  or  in  health,  by 
night  or  by  day,  without  my  first  thought  being  how  I  may 
best  serve  my  Maker.'  "  Hers  was  the  charity  of  the 
Christian,  rather  than  the  narrower  zeal  so  frequent  with 
philanthropists. 

Such  was  in  part  the  state  of  things  when  I  came  into  the 
world.  With  Lord  Castlereagh's  death,  and  the  resumption 


THE   FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  23 

of  power  by  a  ministry  that  included  Mr.  Canning,  a  change 
came  over  England. 

In  a  world  such  as  I  have  endeavored  to  describe,  the 
personal  history,  predilections,  and  domestic  conduct  of  the 
royal  family  were  of  very  much  more  public  importance  than 
are  the  character  and  conduct  of  Queen  Victoria's  sons. 
The  influence  of  the  court  filtered  down,  as  it  were,  through 
all  classes  of  the  people. 

George  III.,  when  a  very  young  man,  came  to  the  throne 
in  1760.  He  was  son  of  that  Frederic  Prince  of  Wales 
whose  name  seems  to  be  held  in  remembrance  only  in  this 
country.  Fredericksburg,  Frederick  County,  Frederick,  and 
Fredericton  were  all  called  after  this  Prince  Fred,  on  whom 
an  epitaph  was  written  by  court  wits ;  and  as  far  as  he  is 
remembered  at  all,  it  is  confirmed  by  posterity :  — 

"  Here  lies  Fred, 
Who  was  alive,  and  is  dead. 
Had  it  been  his  father, 
I  had  rather. 

Had  it  been  his  mother, — 
Better  than  another. 
Had  it  been  his  sister, 
No  one  would  have  missed  her. 
But  as  it  is  Fred, 
Who  was  alive,  and  is  dead, 
There  's  no  more  to  be  said  !  " 

George  III.  enjoys  the  distinction  of  being  the  most  relig- 
ious, virtuous,  and  respectable  man  of  his  family.  "  Farmer 
George  "  his  people  called  him,  and  with  good  reason ;  for, 
under  the  signatures  of  Joseph  Trenchard  and  Ralph  Atkin- 
son, he  wrote  several  excellent  letters  to  an  agricultural 
paper  concerning  new  methods  of  ploughing,  and  the  re- 
claiming of  waste  lands.  He  owed  his  popularity,  not  only 
to  his  real  goodness  of  heart  and  to  a  certain  blustering 
bonhomie,  but  to  the  circumstance  that  he  was  an  English- 
man, and  the  English  had  not  had  a  king  both  born 
and  educated  on  English  soil  since  the  days  of  Queen 
Elizabeth. 

In  early  life  he  had  been  several  times  in  love.     One  of 


24      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

his  loves  was  Hannah  Lightfoot,  a  pretty  Quakeress ;  an- 
other, a  beautiful  countess,  of  whom  he  talked  much  in  his 
insanity  ;  another,  Lady  Sarah  Lennox,  daughter  of  the  Duke 
of  Richmond.  This  preference  was  nipped,  however,  in  the 
bud  by  his  mother  and  his  ministers.  Lady  Sarah  married 
Sir  Charles  Bunbury,  —  a  relative  of  the  eccentric  English- 
man, General  Charles  Lee,  who  was  the  rival  of  Washington, 
—  and  on  Sir  Charles  Bunbury's  death  gave  her  hand  to  one 
of  the  members  of  the  brilliant  family  of  Napier,  whose 
representatives  during  the  last  century  have  done  their 
country  so  much  honor.  George  III.  was  married  to  a 
princess  of  seventeen,  Charlotte,  daughter  of  the  Grand 
Duke  of  Mecklenburg-Strelitz.  It  has  been  the  fashion  to 
describe  her  as  ugly,  narrow-minded,  ignorant,  and  close- 
fisted,  and  she  certainly  was  not  popular  among  the  cour- 
tiers that  surrounded  her.  But  she  says  of  herself,  "  I 
have  found  that  the  advice  of  the  dear  King,  —  of  being 
uniformly  polite  to  everybody,  of  doing  nothing  in  the 
spirit  of  party,  and  of  adhering  closely  to  my  husband's 
family,  —  has  been  my  surest  guidance."  This  advice  was 
accompanied,  on  her  young  husband's  part,  by  the  strong- 
est desire  to  keep  his  young  wife  to  himself,  to  form  her,  to 
convert  her,  as  it  were,  into  his  own  reflection.  He  read 
aloud  to  her  daily,  while  she  was  engaged  in  sewing.  He 
discouraged  all  intimacies,  even  with  his  own  family.  She 
maintained  German  court  punctilio  in  matters  of  etiquette  ; 
but  her  intense  sense  of  decorum  and  propriety  gave  tone 
to  the  English  court  and  aristocracy  for  more  than  a 
generation. 

My  grandfather,  Captain  James  Wormeley,  who  served 
many  years  in  the  Stafford  Regiment  (then  the  King's  body- 
guard) at  Windsor,  had  the  most  tender  recollections  of 
the  King.  I  never  but  once  saw  him  angry  with  his  son, 
my  father,  and  that  was  when  I  was  about  seven  years  old, 
and  he  had  picked  up  in  the  nursery  a  volume  of  Peter 
Parley's  Tales  about  Europe, — just  published, — in  which 
King  George  and  his  insanity  were  spoken  of  with  levity. 
What  my  grandfather  then  said  made  a  life-long  impression 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  2$ 

upon  me ;  I  have  never  been  able  to  speak  otherwise  than 
tenderly  of  George  III. 

And,  indeed,  how  piteous  a  story  is  that  of  his  sad  life  ! 
A  worthless  mother,  a  narrow  education,  no  natural  abilities, 
but  strong  conscientiousness  and  a  kind  heart ;  and,  above 
all,  a  large  and  handsome  family,  of  which  every  member 
proved  a  failure. 

Two  of  his  fifteen  children  died  in  babyhood.  One  of 
these  he  mourned  for,  saying  pathetically  in  his  sorrow  : 
"Some  would  grieve  that  they  had  ever  had  so  sweet  a  child, 
since  they  were  forced  to  part  with  him.  Such  is  not  my 
case.  I  am  thankful  to  God  for  having  generously  allowed 
me  to  enjoy  such  a  creature  for  four  years." 

His  favorite  daughter,  the  Princess  Amelia,  died  in  early 
womanhood,  and  her  father's  sorrow  for  her  loss  made  him 
hopelessly  insane. 

My  grandfather  often  spoke  of  Princess  Amelia  as  one  of 
the  sweetest  children  ever  born.  He  would  tell  of  her  as  he 
used  to  see  her  on  the  Great  Terrace  at  Windsor  Castle, 
trotting  before  her  parents  in  quaint  baby-dress,  with  smiles, 
and  pretty  nods,  and  kissings  of  her  hand  for  every  one 
who  noticed  her.  When  about  fifteen  she  fell  into  ill-health. 
It  was  then  she  is  believed  to  have  written  those  touching 
lines,  "  Unthinking,  idle,  wild,  and  young,"  which  are  asso- 
ciated with  her  memory.  Here  is  a  less  well-known  prayer 
which  after  her  death  was  found  written  on  the  fly-leaf  of 
her  prayer-book  :  — 

"  Gracious  God,  support  thy  unworthy  servant  in  this  time  of 
trial.  Let  not  the  least  murmur  escape  my  lips,  nor  any  senti- 
ment but  of  the  deepest  resignation  enter  my  heart.  Let  me 
make  the  use  thou  intendedst  of  the  affliction  thou  hast  laid  on 
me.  It  has  convinced  me  of  the  vanity  and  emptiness  of  all 
things  here :  let  it  draw  me  to  thee  as  my  support,  and  fill 
my  heart  with  pious  trust  in  thee,  and  in  the  blessings  of  a 
redeeming  Saviour,  as  the  only  consolation  of  a  state  of  trial. 
Amen." 

A  short  time  before  Princess  Amelia's  death  it  is  be- 
lieved that,  in  defiance  of  the  Royal  Marriage  Act,  she 


26      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

was  secretly  united  to  Captain  (afterwards  General)  Fitz- 
roy,  an  officer  of  her  household,  a  gentleman  of  the  family 
of  the  Duke  of  Grafton.  At  her  death  she  left  him  all  her 
jewels,  which,  however,  he  was  not  suffered  to  retain.  With 
a  dying  hand  she  pressed  a  valuable  diamond  on  the  finger 
of  her  father,  and  begged  him  to  remember  her  only  with 
affection. 

Queen  Charlotte  was  not  a  woman  with  an  uncultivated 
mind.  Some  of  her  familiar  letters,  which  during  the  last 
ten  years  have  been  given  to  the  world,  are  playful  and  very 
charming.  They  inform  us,  though  we  can  hardly  realize 
the  fact,  that  George  III.  once  played  an  April-fool  trick 
on  one  of  his  ministers ;  and  here  is  a  little  poem  that 
the  Queen  sent  him,  two  years  after  their  marriage,  in  "  a 
most  elegant  Valentine,  worked  by  her  own  hands."  It 
would  be  impossible  to  believe  that  a  German  lady,  who 
never  acquired  a  perfect  pronunciation  of  English,  could 
have  written  it,  were  it  not  that  there  are  other  little  poems 
in  existence  from  the  same  hand. 

"  Genteel  is  my  Damon,  engaging  his  air  ; 
His  face,  like  the  moon,  is  both  ruddy  and  fair. 
Soft  Love  sits  enthroned  in  the  beam  of  his  eyes : 
He 's  manly,  yet  tender  ;  he  's  fond,  yet  he  's  wise. 

"  He  's  ever  good-humored  ;  he 's  generous  and  gay ; 
His  presence  can  always  drive  sorrow  away. 
No  vanity  sways  him,  no  folly  is  seen  ; 
But  open  his  temper,  and  noble  his  mien. 

"By  virtue  illumined,  his  actions  appear; 
His  passions  are  calm,  and  his  reason  is  clear. 
An  affable  sweetness  attends  on  his  speech  ; 
He 's  willing  to  learn,  though  he 's  able  to  teach. 

"  He  has  promised  to  love  me  :  his  word  I  '11  believe ; 
For  his  heart  is  too  honest  to  let  him  deceive. 
Then  blame  me,  ye  fair  ones,  if  justly  you  can, 
For  the  picture  I  've  drawn  is  exactly  the  man." 

And,  indeed,  all  this  was  true,  except  as  to  the  "  noble 
mien,"  —  as  true  as  any  eulogy  can  be  expected  to  be.  It 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE   III.  2/ 

described  George  III.  in  his  earlier  days,  before  his  dis- 
position had  been  troubled  by  incipient  insanity.  The 
whole  story  of  that  insanity  is  piteous  in  the  extreme. 
From  the  age  of  twenty-seven,  he  had  been  subject  to 
brief  attacks  of  delirium.  In  1788  a  regency  had  to  be 
appointed.  He  recovered  in  six  months,  but  was  stricken 
down  again  in  1801,  and  subsequently  in  1804.  In  1810 
he  became  hopelessly  insane,  and  never  recovered. 

"At  intervals  during  his  first  attacks,"  says  one  who  was 
about  the  court  at  that  period,  "  he  still  took  an  occasional 
interest  in  politics.  His  perception  was  good,  though 
mixed  up  with  a  number  of  erroneous  ideas.  His  memory 
was  tenacious,  but  his  judgment  unsettled.  The  loss  of 
royal  authority  seemed  to  prey  upon  his  mind. 

"  His  malady  seemed  rather  to  increase  than  abate  up  to 
1814,  when,  at  the  time  of  the  visit  of  the  Allied  Sovereigns 
to  England,  he  gave  indications  of  returning  reason,  and 
was  made  acquainted  with  the  interesting  events  that  had 
recently  occurred.  The  Queen  one  day  found  him  singing 
a  hymn,  and  accompanying  himself  on  the  harpsichord. 
After  he  had  concluded  the  hymn,  he  knelt  down,  prayed 
for  his  family  and  for  the  nation,  and  earnestly  entreated 
for  the  complete  restoration  of  his  mental  powers.  He 
then  burst  into  tears,  and  his  reason  suddenly  left  him ;  but 
he  afterwards  had  occasionally  lucid  intervals." 

Towards  the  end  of  his  life  he  became  deaf.  His  sight 
was  already  gone.  He  imbibed  the  idea  that  he  was  dead, 
and  said,  "  I  must  have  a  suit  of  black,  in  memory  of 
George  III.,  for  whom  I  know  there  is  to  be  a  general 
mourning." 

In  1817  he  appeared  again  to  have  a  slight  glimmering 
of  reason.  His  sense  of  hearing  returned,  more  acute  than 
ever,  and  he  could  distinguish  people  by  their  footsteps. 

"After  1818  he  occupied  a  long  suite  of  rooms,  in  which 
were  placed  several  pianos  and  harpsichords.  At  these  he 
would  frequently  stop  during  his  walks,  play  a  few  notes 
from  Handel,  and  then  stroll  on.  He  seemed  cheerful, 
and  would  sometimes  talk  aloud,  as  if  addressing  some  one ; 


28      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

but  his  discourse  bore  only  reference  to  past  events,  for  he 
had  no  knowledge  of  recent  circumstances,  either  political 
or  domestic.  Towards  the  end  of  1819  his  appetite  began 
to  fail  him.  In  January,  1820,  it  was  found  impossible  to 
keep  him  warm ;  his  remaining  teeth  dropped  out,  and  he 
was  almost  a  skeleton.  On  January  27,  1820,  he  was  con- 
fined to  his  bed,  and  two  days  later  (a  few  days  after  the 
death  of  the  Duke  of  Kent)  he  died,  aged  eighty-two  years." 

He  was  the  father  of  nine  sons  and  six  daughters ;  but  he 
had  only  five  grandchildren  of  legitimate  birth. 

Mr.  Adams's  account  of  his  presentation  to  the  King  at 
St.  James's  Palace,  1785,  as  the  first  Minister  Plenipotentiary 
of  the  United  States,  is  familiar  to  many,  but  to  all  it  must 
be  interesting. 

"  I  passed,"  he  says,  "  through  the  lesser  rooms  into  the  King's 
closet.  The  door  was  shut,  and  I  was  left  with  His  Majesty 
and  the  Secretary  of  State  alone.  I  made  the  three  reverences, 
one  at  the  door,  another  about  half  way  up  the  rooms,  and  the 
third  before  the  presence,  according  to  the  usage  established  at 
this  and  all  the  courts  of  Europe,  and  then  addressed  myself  to 
His  Majesty  in  the  following  words  :  '  Sir,  the  United  States 
of  America  have  appointed  me  their  Minister  Plenipotentiary  to 
Your  Majesty,  and  have  directed  me  to  deliver  to  Your  Majesty 
this  letter,  which  contains  the  evidence  of  it  It  is  in  obedience 
to  their  express  commands  that  I  have  the  honor  to  assure 
Your  Majesty  of  their  unanimous  disposition  and  desire  to  cul- 
tivate the  most  friendly  and  liberal  intercourse  between  Your 
Majesty's  subjects  and  their  citizens,  and  of  their  best  wishes 
for  Your  Majesty's  health  and  happiness,  and  for  that  of  your 
royal  family.  The  appointment  of  a  Minister  from  the  United 
States  to  Your  Majesty's  court  will  form  an  epoch  in  the  history 
of  England  and  America.  I  think  myself  more  fortunate  than 
all  my  fellow-citizens  in  having  the  distinguished  honor  to  be 
the  first  to  stand  in  Your  Majesty's  presence  in  a  diplomatic 
character;  and  I  shall  esteem  myself  the  happiest  of  men  if  I 
can  be  instrumental  in  recommending  my  country  more  and 
more  to  Your  Majesty's  royal  benevolence,  and  of  restoring  an 
entire  confidence,  esteem,  and  affection  —  or,  in  better  words, 
the  old  good-nature  and  the  old  good-humor  —  between  people 
who,  although  separated  by  an  ocean,  and  under  different 
governments,  have  the  same  language,  a  similar  religion,  and 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  29 

kindred  blood.  I  beg  Your  Majesty's  permission  to  add  that 
although  I  have  sometimes  before  been  intrusted  by  my  country, 
it  was  never,  in  my  whole  life,  in  a  manner  so  agreeable  to  my- 
self.' The  King  listened  to  every  word  I  said  with  dignity,  it  is 
true,  but  with  an  apparent  emotion.  Whether  it  was  the  nature 
of  the  interview,  or  whether  it  was  my  visible  agitation,  for  I  felt 
more  than  I  did  or  could  express,  that  touched  him,  I  cannot 
say ;  but  he  was  much  affected,  and  answered  me  with  more 
tremor  than  I  had  spoken  with,  and  said,  '  Sir,  the  circum- 
stances of  this  audience  are  so  extraordinary,  and  the  language 
you  have  now  held  is  so  extremely  proper,  and  the  feelings  you 
have  discovered  so  justly  adapted  to  the  occasion,  that  I  must 
say  I  not  only  receive  with  pleasure  the  assurance  of  the  friendly 
disposition  of  the  United  States,  but  I  am  very  glad  their  choice 
has  fallen  on  you  to  be  their  minister.  I  wish  you,  sir,  to  be- 
lieve—  that  it  may  be  understood  in  America  —  that  I  have 
done  nothing  in  the  late  contest  but  what  I  thought  myself  in- 
dispensably bound  to  do  by  the  duty  that  I  owed  to  my  people. 
I  will  be  very  frank  with  you.  I  was  the  last  man  to  conform 
to  the  separation;  but  the  separation  having  been  made,  and 
having  become  inevitable,  I  have  always  said,  as  I  say  now,  let 
the  connection  of  language,  religion,  and  blood  have  their  natu- 
ral and  full  effect.'  I  dare  not  say  that  these  were  the  King's 
precise  words,  for  although  his  pronunciation  is  as  distinct  as  I 
ever  heard,  he  hesitated  sometimes  between  his  periods,  and 
between  much  of  the  same  periods.  He  was  indeed  much 
affected,  and  I  was  not  less  so;  but  I  think  all  he  said  to  me 
should  not  be  kept  secret  in  America,  unless  His  Majesty  or 
his  Secretary  of  State  should  think  proper  to  report  it. 

"  The  King  then  asked  me  whether  I  came  last  from  France, 
and  on  my  answering  in  the  affirmative,  he,  with  an  air  of  friend- 
liness, and  smiling,  or  rather  laughing,  said,  'There  is  an 
opinion  among  some  people  that  you  are  not  the  most  attached 
of  all  your  countrymen  to  the  manners  of  France.'  I  was  sur- 
prised at  this,  because  I  thought  it  indiscreet,  and  a  descent 
from  his  dignity.  I  was  a  little  embarrassed,  but  determined 
not  to  deny  the  truth  on  one  hand,  nor  have  him  to  infer  from  it 
my  attachment  to  England  on  the  other.  I  threw  off  as  much 
gravity  as  I  could,  and  assumed  an  air  of  gayety  and  a  tone  of 
decision  as  far  as  was  decent,  and  said,  '  That  opinion,  sir, 
was  not  mistaken.  I  must  avow  to  Your  Majesty  that  I  have 
no  attachment  but  to  my  own  country.'  The  King  replied, 
quick  as  lightning:  'An  honest  man  will  never  have  any 
other. ' " 


30      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

The  sons  of  George  III.  were  George,  Frederic,  William 
Henry,  Edward,  Ernest,  Augustus,  Adolphus,  Octavius,  and 
Alfred.  The  last  two  died  in  infancy.  His  daughters  were 
Charlotte,  Augusta,  Elizabeth,  Sophia,  Mary,  and  Amelia. 

Of  these  princesses  it  has  been  truly  said  "  that  during 
the  course  of  their  long  lives,  full  of  trials,  dulness,  and 
monotony,  they  showed  the  same  constancy  and  patience, 
with  a  display  of  domestic  virtues  and  amiability  that  is 
truly  remarkable.  Admirable  daughters,  tolerant  and  affec- 
tionate sisters,  excellent  wives,  sagacious  and  observing,  they 
earned  the  respect  and  admiration  of  all,  and  reflected 
credit  on  the  Queen  their  mother." 

We  have  already  spoken  of  the  Princess  Amelia.  Her 
sisters  led  all  of  them  unhappy  lives,  ground  down  by  court 
restraints,  and  made  sorrowful  by  the  always  uncertain  con- 
dition of  the  King,  who  was  continually  trembling  on  the  verge 
of  insanity,  even  when  considered  in  his  right  mind.  None 
married  until  very  late  in  life,  and  none  had  any  children. 

Charlotte,  the  Princess  Royal,  was  thirty-one  years  old 
when  a  suitor  presented  himself  for  her  in  the  Duke  of 
Wiirtemberg.  He  was  a  very  stout,  elderly  man,  so  stout 
that  he  had  had  to  have  a  curve  cut  out  of  his  dining- table 
to  accommodate  his  obesity.  In  early  life  he  had  distin- 
guished himself  as  a  soldier,  and  had  become  a  favorite  of 
Frederic  the  Great,  who  promoted  his  marriage  with  a  lady 
of  his  own  house,  the  eldest  daughter  of  the  Duke  of  Bruns- 
wick and  of  Augusta,  sister  of  George  III. ;  she  was  sister 
to  Caroline  of  Brunswick,  wife  of  George  IV.  Of  the  men 
of  this  family  of  Brunswick,  it  might  be  said  that  they  were 
all  sans  peur,  but  few  of  the  women  were  sans  reproche.  The 
Prince  and  Princess  of  Wtirtemberg  a  year  or  two  after 
their  marriage  went  to  the  Russian  court,  where  Catherine 
II.  was  then  supreme.  There  the  Princess  greatly  miscon- 
ducted herself,  and  is  supposed  to  have  incurred  Catherine's 
enmity  by  attaching  one  of  that  lady's  ex-favorites  to  her  train 
of  lovers.  Her  husband  returned  to  Wurtemberg  with  his 
children,  leaving  his  wife  behind.  She  was  imprisoned  by 
Catherine  in  the  fortress  of  Lode,  and  soon  afterwards  her 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  HI.  31 

death  was  reported,  in  1788.  Whether  she  died  by  violence 
or  natural  causes,  or  whether  indeed  she  really  died,  has 
always  been  doubtful.  Many  persons  thought  her  escape 
was  effected  by  one  of  her  lovers,  and  that  she  fled  with  him 
to  Italy.  George  III.  made  careful  inquiry  into  the  circum- 
stances of  her  death  before  he  permitted  his  daughter  to  be 
engaged  to  the  supposed  widower,  and  he  appears  to  have 
been  fully  satisfied  .by  what  was  told  him.  The  Princess 
Royal  seems  to  have  been  glad  to  escape  the  restraints  of 
her  home  in  England,  and  not  unwillingly  married  her  stout, 
elderly  suitor.  All  accounts  say  that  she  led  afterwards  a 
happy  life,  devoted  to  the  care  of  her  step-children  and  her 
step-grandchildren.  One  of  her  step-daughters  was  the 
admirable  Princess  Catherine,  who  married  Jerome  Bona- 
parte much  against  her  will ;  but  she  made  him  a  devoted 
wife,  and  when,  after  the  downfall  of  the  Bonapartes,  she  was 
entreated  by  her  father  to  forsake  her  husband,  her  letter  of 
refusal  is  a  touching  expression  of  womanly  fidelity  and  of 
a  wifely  sense  of  honor. 

The  Duke  of  Wiirtemberg  was  made  a  king  by  the  Em- 
peror Napoleon  as  a  reward  for  his  adherence  to  the  French 
cause  in  the  war  of  1805  with  Austria.  It  is  thus  that  the 
eldest  daughter  of  George  III  writes  of  the  way  she  received, 
for  her  husband's  sake,  her  own  country's  national  enemy  : 

"  It  was,  of  course,  very  painful  to  me  to  receive  him  with 
courtesy,  but  I  had  no  choice ;  the  least  failure  on  my  part 
might  have  been  a  sufficient  pretext  for  depriving  my  husband 
and  his  children  of  this  kingdom.  It  was  one  of  the  occasions 
in  which  it  was  absolutely  necessary  de  faire  bonne  mine  d 
manuals  gout.  To  me  he  was  always  perfectly  civil." 

Napoleon  said  afterwards  of  another  German  queen,  — 

"  She  should  remember  that  but  for  me  she  would  be  only 
the  daughter  of  a  miserable  petty  Margrave,  and  imitate  the 
conduct  of  the  Queen  of  Wiirtemberg,  daughter  of  the  greatest 
King  on  earth  !  " 

The  courteous  reception  of  the  Emperor  Napoleon  must 
indeed  have  demanded  much  self-restraint  on  the  part  of 
a  lady  brought  up  to  consider  him  the  Corsican  Monster, 


32      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

as  was  the  fashion  in  England  in  those  days.  A  few  years 
before  the  interview,  she  recorded  in  her  journal  that  she 
had  been  reading  a  scurrilous  life  of  him,  published  to  suit 
the  popular  opinion  of  his  character. 

"The  book,"  she  says,  "gives  a  very  accurate  account  of 
the  Monster  from  his  childhood.  I  must  tell  you  what  hap- 
pened to  me.  I  was  reading  to  myself,  and,  my  maid  was  in 
the  room,  and,  being  very  eager,  I  called  out  a  propos  of  one  of 
his  very  malicious  acts  as  a  boy,  '  Oh,  you  devil ! '  On  which 
she  said,  '  I  know  what  you  are  reading,  —  I  read  some  of  it 
this  morning ;  and  a  more  horrid  creature  never  existed.'  I 
was  then  shocked  at  having  called  him  devil.  It  was  an  injus- 
tice to  Beelzebub,  who  was  a  fallen  angel ;  for  I  believe  Bona- 
parte to  be  an  indigenous  devil !  " 

When  the  stout  King  died,  in  1816,  his  widow  thus  writes 
to  her  family  :  — 

"  I  believe  never  was  any  one  more  attached  to  another 
than  I  was  to  the  late  King.  This  affection,  which  during  our 
union  was  the  happiness  of  my  life,  makes  me  look  forward 
with  impatience  to  the  end  of  my  days,  when  I  trust,  through 
the  mercy  of  Providence,  to  be  reunited  to  my  husband  in  a 
better  world.  The  present  King  behaves  very  kindly  to  me, 
and  has  shown  the  most  dutiful  affection  to  his  late  father." 

She  never  returned  to  England,  but  died  at  Louisburg, 
Oct.  6,  1828,  made  happy  by  the  affection  of  those  whom 
she  calls  "  my  dear  little  grandchildren,"  and  who,  she  adds, 

"  are  really  worth  seeing.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  L ,  who  saw 

them  last  year,  will,  I  am  sure,  give  you  a  full  account  of 
these  little  angels,  who  they  seemed  much  pleased  with." 

The  next  sister  was  Princess  Augusta.  Her  intended 
bridegroom  was  a  prince  of  Denmark;  but  the  marriage 
negotiations  came  to  an  end,  owing  to  matrimonial  com- 
plications between  the  reigning  Danish  King  and  his  wife, 
Caroline  Matilda,  posthumous  daughter  of  Frederic,  Prince 
of  Wales,  and  sister  of  George  III.  Princess  Augusta 
never  married.  She  died  in  1840.  Contemporaries  spoke 
of  her  as  the  most  charming  princess  among  those  of  whom 
one  who  lived  among  them  and  knew  them  well  has 
written,  "  I  really  knew  not  such  girls  in  any  rank  of  life. 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  33 

They  are  all  amiable  in  their  different  ways,  and  they 
are  all  different."  My  grandfather's  favorite  was  Princess 
Elizabeth,  who  had  a  sweet  face,  full  of  goodness  and  of 
intellect ;  but  she  became  immensely  stout  even  in  her  years 
of  early  womanhood.  She  wrote  and  published  a  little 
book  of  verses,  illustrating  the  poems  with  her  own  de- 
signs. She  was  also  an  enthusiastic  collector  of  old  China 
and  bric-a-brac.  She  remained  unmarried  till  1818,  when 
she  was  forty-eight  years  old.  Then  another  stout  German 
came  to  England  as  her  suitor,  Philfp  Augustus,  the  Land- 
grave of  Hesse-Homburg,  whose  dominions  and  court  were 
the  originals  of  the  court  of  Pumpernickel. 

That  the  poor  princesses,  while  in  England,  lived  in 
dread  of  what  might  happen  to  them  under  the  regency 
of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  and  were  ready  to  accept  any  fate 
that  might  remove  them  from  his  authority,  may  be  gathered 
from  this  letter,  written  by  Princess  Elizabeth  to  Lady  Har- 
court,  a  friend  of  the  family  :  — 

"  Think,  my  beloved  Lady  Harcourt,  how  things  are  changed, 
that  I  now  pray  to  the  Almighty  that  I  may  leave  this  country. 
Turn  which  way  we  will,  all  appears  gloom,  and  melancholy  stares 
one  full  in  the  face.  The  prospect  we  have  to  look  forward  to 
in  the  wife  of  him  who  should  be  our  protector  in  future  times, 
is  so  dreadful  that  I  had  rather  far  choose  the  deserts  of  Arabia 
than  all  the  amusements  of  London  or  the  delights  of  the  coun- 
try in  England.  Do  pray  for  me,  and  wish  for  us  all  to  be  gone. 
My  much-beloved  mother  knows  a  little  how  sincerely  we  all 
wish  to  be  gone;  but  a  daughter  who  loves  her  as  truly  as  I  do 
must  feel  the  indelicacy  of  speaking  too  openly  on  a  subject 
which  separates  us  from  her;  but  indeed,  indeed,  it  is  most 
necessary.  ...  I  fear  everything,  —  nearly  my  own  thoughts  ; 
but  I  trust  in  the  mercy  of  God,  who  will  with  his  mercy  guide 
my  course,  and,  what  I  love  almost  best  in  the  world,  my 
brother.  .  .  .  But  do  get  him  to  wish'  us  all  away." 

The  Landgrave  of  Homburg  made  anything  but  a  favor- 
able impression  on  society  in  England.  He  is  described 
by  contemporaries  as  a  "gross,  corpulent  German,"  as 
"smelling  always  of  tobacco,"  as  "snoring  at  theatres;" 

3 


34      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

and  "all  wondered  at  the  destiny  which  could  assign  so 
charming  a  princess  to  such  a  monster." 

A  great-aunt  of  Princess  Elizabeth,  the  Princess  Mary, 
daughter  of  George  II.,  had  married  a  former  Landgrave 
of  Hesse- Homburg,  and  her  memory  was  cherished  in  the 
tiny  principality. 

Mr.  Rush  wrote  home  an  account  of  the  wedding  :  — 

"  The  conduct  of  the  Queen  was  admirable.  This  venerable 
personage,  the  head  of  a  large  family,  her  children  then  cling- 
ing about  her,  the  female  head  of  a  great  empire,  in  the  seventy- 
sixth  year  of  her  age,  went  the  rounds  of  the  company,  speaking 
to  all.  There  was  a  kindliness  in  her  manner  from  which  time 
had  stricken  away  useless  forms.  No  one  did  she  omit,  and 
she  wore  hanging  from  her  neck  a  miniature  portrait  of  the 
King.  He  was  absent,  scathed  by  the  hand  of  Heaven  ;  a 
marriage  going  on  in  one  of  his  palaces,  he  the  lonely  suffer- 
ing tenant  in  another.  But  the  portrait  was  a  token  superior 
to  a  crown.  It  bespoke  the  affection  in  which  for  fifty  years 
this  royal  pair  had  lived  together.  The  scene  would  have 
been  one  of  interest  anywhere.  May  it  not  be  noticeable  on 
a  throne?" 

My  grandfather  used  to  grieve  over  the  accounts  brought 
home  by  travellers  of  the  poverty  of  the  Landgravine's  sur- 
roundings. They  told  of  the  bare  furnishing  of  her  tall 
old  Schloss,  and  of  her  lack  of  the  comforts  provided  in 
England  for  every  middle-class  family ;  yet  she  was  prob- 
ably happier  in  her  married  life  than  she  had  been  at 
home.  She  surrounded  her  old  Schloss  with  an  English 
garden.  She  called  it  her  "  dear  and  blessed  home." 
The  Landgrave,  too,  improved  under  her  influence,  and 
thus  Miss  Knight  speaks  of  him  in  her  memoirs  :  "  He 
has  noble  frankness  of  character  and  a  patriarchal  kindness 
in  his  family,  which,  added  to  his  graciousness  and  his  care 
of  his  subjects,  render  him  worthy  of  being  well  beloved. 
He  is  well  educated,  very  neat  in  his  person,  and  never 
comes  into  company  without  changing  his  dress  if  he  has 
been  smoking." 

The  Landgravine  died  in  1840, — the  year  before  the 
gaming  tables  were  set  up  in  Homburg. 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  35 

Of  Princess  Sophia  I  can  tell  very  little.  She  had 
delicate  health.  After  the  deaths  of  her  father  and  mother 
she  had  her  separate  establishment,  and  lived  in  retirement 
in  the  country.  It  is  believed  that,  like  her  sister  Amelia, 
she  had  been  early  married  to  an  officer  in  her  household. 
She  died  in  1848. 

Princess  Mary,  the  prettiest  of  a  very  handsome  family, 
had  a  sad  and  romantic  history.  When  she  was  twenty 
years  old  she  was  engaged  to  her  cousin,  William,  Duke  of 
Gloucester.  The  young  people  were  good-looking,  ami- 
able, and  exceedingly  attached  to  each  other;  but  their 
engagement  was  broken  by  command  of  George  IV., 
because,  having  no  son,  and  only  one  daughter,  the  Prin- 
cess Charlotte,  and  as,  having  separated  from  his  wife,  he 
was  likely  to  have  no  more  children,  it  might  be  desirable 
to  marry  the  little  heiress  of  the  English  crown  to  the  Duke 
of  Gloucester.  He  was  therefore  ordered  to  remain  un- 
married until  this  little  lady  became  old  enough  to  take  a 
husband,  when,  if  her  family  could  not  find  for  her  a  more 
eligible  prince,  she  would  have  to  be  married  to  her  elderly 
cousin.  The  Prince  of  Orange  proposed  to  Princess  Char- 
lotte, and  the  hopes  of  her  Aunt  Mary  rose  high.  But 
Charlotte  in  the  end  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  the 
Prince  of  Orange.  How  she  married  Prince  Leopold  of 
Saxe-Coburg,  and  how  deeply  she  was  attached  to  him, 
must  be  the  subject  of  part  of  another  chapter.  "As 
Princess  Charlotte  after  her  marriage  descended  the  great 
staircase  at  Carlton  House,  she  was  met  at  the  foot  of  it 
by  her  aunt,  the  Princess  Mary,  with  open  arms,  and  a  face 
bathed  in  tears."  A  few  weeks  later  Princess  Mary  be- 
came Duchess  of  Gloucester.  For  eighteen  years  she  lived 
happily  (though  childless)  with  her  kindly,  unintellectual 
cousin  and  husband,  but  she  long  survived  him.  She 
died  in  1857,  the  last  of  the  Queen's  aunts.  The  Earl  of 
Malmesbury,  in  his  Memoirs,  speaks  of  her  as  "  all  good- 
humor  and  pleasantness."  "Her  manners,"  he  adds,  "are 
perfect,  and  I  never  saw  or  conversed  with  any  princess  so 
exactly  what  she  ought  to  be." 


36     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Such  is  the  history  of  George  III.'s  six  daughters,  all 
lovely,  all  amiable,  all  with  marred  or  manquJ  lives. 
Now  we  will  turn  to  the  seven  sons  who  grew  to  manhood, 
or  rather  to  six  of  them,  for  we  will  leave  aside  George, 
Prince  of  Wales,  whose  matrimonial  history  will  demand  a 
considerable  share  of  our  next  chapter. 

The  sons  of  George  III.  may  be  said  to  form  two  groups, 
—  the  four  elder  boys,  and  the  three  younger. 

The  four  elder  were  George,  Prince  of  Wales,  Frederick, 
Duke  of  York,  William,  Duke  of  Clarence,  and  Edward 
Duke  of  Kent.  The  others  were  Ernest,  Duke  of  Cum- 
berland, Augustus,  Duke  of  Sussex,  and  Adolphus,  Duke 
of  Cambridge. 

Frederick,  Duke  of  York,  was  the  prince  of  most  talent  in 
his  family.  He  was  for  many  years  Commander-in-Chief 
of  the  British  Army ;  and  although  the  expeditions  he  com- 
manded in  1793  and  1799  met  with  little  success,  he  was 
admirable  as  an  organizer  and  reformer.  His  manners,  too, 
were  those  of  a  finished  gentleman,  and  by  his  affability  he 
made  himself  many  friends.  On  the  other  hand,  he  brought 
great  scandal  on  himself  and  on  his  family  by  allowing  an 
infamous  woman,  Mrs.  Clarke,  to  sell  to  officers  promises 
of  promotion,  to  obtain  which  she  used  her  influence  with 
the  Commander-in-Chief.  This  affair  came  to  light,  and 
was  investigated  by  Parliament. 

The  Duke  of  York  was  always  in  debt.  Mr.  Charles 
Greville  relates  that  he  and  his  Duchess  were  often  thankful 
to  take  loans  from  their  attendants.  On  one  occasion  they 
were  unable  to  raise  money  enough  to  pay  some  village 
laborers  who  were  digging  a  drain. 

My  father  used  to  tell  a  story  of  the  fashionable  tailor  in 
London  in  his  day,  whose  bill  against  the  Duke  of  York  fo* 
personal  attire  and  liveries  became  so  enormous  that  he  was 
seriously  embarrassed  for  lack  of  payment.  His  friends 
urged  him  to  take  a  post-chaise  and  drive  down  to  Oatlands, 
the  Duke's  place  in  the  country,  state  his  case,  and  ask  a 
settlement.  On  his  return  his  advisers  crowded  round  him. 
"  Well,"  cried  the  tailor,  shaking  his  head,  "  he  seemed  so 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE   III.  37 

glad  to  see  me,  and  treated  me  so  like  a  gentleman,  that 
I  could  not  ask  him  for  money." 

When,  after  the  Duke's  death,  it  was  proposed  to  erect  a 
column  to  his  memory  in  Carlton  Gardens,  a  caricaturist  in 
"  Punch  "  drew  a  plan  for  it,  —  an  enormous  file  of  bills 
strung  on  a  wire,  with  the  Duke's  statue  on  the  top.  Those 
bills  were  eventually  paid  by  a  grant  from  Parliament. 

The  Duchess  of  York  was  Princess  Frederica,  daughter  of 
King  Frederick  William  II.  of  Prussia.  She  lived  for  thirty 
years  in  retirement  in  the  country,  chiefly  remarkable  for 
her  care  of  forty  dogs.  We  judge  from  Greville's  Memoirs 
that  in  their  later  years  the  pair  got  what  little  money  they 
could  command  chiefly  by  playing  cards.  The  Duchess  died 
in  1822,  and  her  husband  in  January,  1827.  His  funeral  pro- 
cession was  kept  standing  two  hours  in  a  damp  chapel  at 
Windsor  on  a  flagged  floor,  waiting  for  George  IV.  as  chief 
mourner.  Canning  insisted  that  Lord  Eldon,  the  Chancel- 
lor, should  stand  on  his  cocked  hat ;  and  for  want  of  the 
same  precaution,  took  the  cold  of  which  he  died  some 
months  after. 

The  Duke  of  York  had  a  very  poor  opinion  of  his  brother, 
George  IV.,  and  did  not  hesitate  to  tell  his  intimates  that  his 
brother's  conduct  on  some  points  was  so  monstrous  that  he 
could  only  suppose  he  was  mad. 

When  the  sad  death  of  Princess  Charlotte  took  place, 
Nov.  5,  1817,  most  of  her  male  relations  were  unmarried. 
My  father  used  to  tell  how  he  was  standing  on  Waterloo 
Bridge  a  week  after  her  death,  when  three  Government 
messengers  passed  him  at  a  gallop,  each  bearing  an  offer  of 
marriage  from  a  bachelor  royal  duke  to  some  princess  in 
Germany.  The  three  suitors  were  the  Duke  of  Clarence, 
the  Duke  of  Kent,  and  the  Duke  of  Cambridge. 

The  first  married  Adelaide,  Princess  of  Saxe-Meiningen. 
The  second  married  Victoria,  Princess  of  Saxe-Coburg, 
sister  of  Prince  Leopold,  and  widow  of  the  Duke  of  Lei- 
ningen,  by  whom  she  had  had  two  children,  —  a  son,  the 
Prince  of  Leiningen,  and  a  daughter,  Feodora.  subsequently 
married  to  Prince  Hohenlohe.  The  third  suitor  was  the 


38     ENGLAND   IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Duke  of  Cambridge,  who  married  Augusta,  daughter  of  the 
Duke  of  Hesse-Cassel. 

The  Duke  of  Clarence  became  afterwards  William  IV. 
His  wife,  Queen  Adelaide,  was  a  most  admirable  woman, 
who  lived  long  after  his  death.  They  had  two  children, 
both  daughters,  who  hardly  survived  their  birth. 

Edward,  the  Duke  of  Kent,  fourth  son  of  George  III.,  was 
the  ill-treated  and  neglected  member  of  his  family,  —  at 
least,  he  considered  himself  neglected,  though  several  good 
appointments  were  given  him.  In  his  boyhood  anything 
wrong  that  was  done  by  his  elder  brothers  was  attributed  to 
him.  He  was  considered  the  member  of  the  family  who 
was  of  small  account.  He  was  sent  to  Germany,  as  all  his 
brothers  were  (except  the  Prince  of  Wales),  for  military 
instruction,  and  was  then  put  into  the  army ;  but  he  was 
kept  always  with  a  very  small  allowance.  His  father  was 
at  least  partially  insane  during  his  early  manhood,  —  which 
was  one  reason,  probably,  why  the  young  men  were  sent 
from  England,  —  and  ministers  were  worried  by  Prince 
Edward's  continual  requests  for  money.  The  history  of  his 
lost  outfits  is  both  comic  and  curious.  By  shipwreck  or  by 
capture,  they  were  lost  one  after  the  other ;  and  when  this 
was  the  case,  the  ministry  was  in  no  hurry  to  replace  them. 
He  held  several  positions  of  trust  in  Nova  Scotia  and  Can- 
ada, where  he  made  warm  friends  in  all  classes  of  society. 
At  Halifax  are  still  shown  the  dilapidated  remains  of  the 
Prince's  Lodge,  which  the  Prince  quitted  in  1800,  amid 
the  general  grief  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  place,  with  whom 
he  was  very  popular, —  "a  grief,"  says  Judge  Haliburton, 
"  enhanced,  no  doubt,  by  his  high  rank  as  the  King's  son,  to 
say  nothing  of  the  lavish  expenditure  of  money  for  which  he 
had  for  six  years  been  most  famous  at  the  Lodge  and  in 
the  town,  and  for  the  associations  which  gathered  round 
his  every  movement,  and  the  prestige  which  was  given  to 
society  by  his  presence,  all  which  were  to  be  now  lost 
forever." 

His  moral  character  was  not  above  reproach,  but  he  never 
made  the  scandal  of  an  openly  irregular  life,  like  almost  all 


THE  FAMILY   OF  GEORGE  III.  39 

his  brothers.  Warm-hearted  and  affectionate,  and,  justly  or 
unjustly,  considering  himself  estranged  from  his  family,  his 
life  was  probably  a  very  far  from  happy  one,  and  the  only 
opportunity  afforded  him  by  which  he  could  really  have 
distinguished  himself  led  to  disaster  and  disgrace. 

He  was  sent  to  Gibraltar  as  its  Military  Governor,  and 
entered  upon  his  duties  with  great  ardor.  The  English 
troops  there  at  that  period  were  two  wholly  disorganized 
regiments.  Prince  Edward  introduced  such  strict  discipline, 
and  carried  it  out  so  energetically,  that  complaints  in  shoals 
were  sent  home  to  the  English  Government,  and  the  soldiers 
broke  out  into  open  mutiny.  This  was  suppressed  with 
difficulty,  and  the  Prince  was  recalled  to  England.  He 
was  never  again  trusted  with  any  command  of  importance, 
but  was  always  treated  as  the  family  ne'er-do-weel.  It  is 
surprising  that,  under  the  mortifications  he  suffered,  he  did 
not  go  wholly  to  the  bad.  In  1818  he  was  required,  as  a 
matter  of  state  policy,  to  be  married.  The  Duchess  of 
Kent,  although,  as  I  have  said,  she  was  the  mother  of  two 
children  by  her  first  marriage,  made  it  the  chief  duty  of  her 
life  after  her  union  with  the  Duke  of  Kent,  and  the  birth  of 
their  little  daughter,  to  acquit  herself  rightly  of  the  respon- 
sibility of  training  up  the  presumptive  heiress  to  the  English 
throne. 

She  and  the  Duke  at  the  time  they  expected  their  child's 
birth  were  too  poor  to  reside  in  England.  The  Duke,  indeed, 
was  burdened  with  debts,  and  his  allowance  had  always 
been  small.  He  wrote  to  his  brother,  George  IV.,  entreating 
for  money  to  enable  him  to  come  home,  that  the  heir  or 
heiress  presumptive  to  the  throne  of  England  might  be  born 
on  English  soil.  No  notice  was  taken  of  this  request.  The 
Duchess  had  come  as  near  as  possible  to  the  coast  of  Eng- 
land, and  it  is  possible  that  Queen  Victoria  would  have  been 
born  a  Frenchwoman,  had  not  Alderman  Wood  advanced 
money  to  the  impecunious  pair. 

On  May  24,  1819,  Queen  Victoria  was  born,  at  Kensing- 
ton Palace.  On  the  following  January  her  father  died  at 
Sidmouth,  after  a  very  short  illness,  leaving  debts  which 


4O     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

when  Queen  Victoria  came  to  the  throne  she  at  once  as- 
sumed, and,  setting  aside  part  of  her  private  income  every 
year  for  the  purpose,  she  has  long  since  paid  them  off 
entirely.  Here  is  a  pretty  picture  of  the  Duke  and  his  baby 
daughter,  written  by  one  who  visited  them  at  Kensington 
Palace,  just  before  their  removal  to  the  sea-side  :  — 

"  On  my  rising  to  take  leave,  the  Duke  intimated  it  was  his 
wish  that  I  should  see  the  infant  Princess  in  her  crib;  adding, 
'  As  it  may  be  some  time  before  we  meet  again,  I  should  like  you 
to  see  the  child  and  give  her  your  blessing.'  The  Duke  pre- 
ceded me  into  the  little  Princess's  room,  and  on  my  closing  a 
short  prayer  that  as  she  grew  in  years  she  might  grow  in  grace 
and  favor  both  with  God  and  man,  nothing  could  exceed  the 
fervor  and  feeling  with  which  her  father  responded  with  an 
emphatic  Amen.  Then,  with  no  slight  emotion,  he  continued: 
4  Don't  pray  simply  that  hers  may  be  a  brilliant  career,  and 
exempt  from  those  trials  and  struggles  which  have  pursued 
her  father,  but  pray  that  God's  blessing  may  rest  on  her,  that 
it  may  overshadow  her,  and  that  in  all  her  coming  years  she 
may  be  guided  and  guarded  by  God.'" 

The  Duchess  of  Kent  was  a  sensible,  dignified,  judicious 
woman,  who  lived  in  retirement  and  devoted  herself  to  her 
child.  The  little  Princess  Victoria  was  rarely  allowed  to 
appear  in  public,  and  was  almost  unknown  to  her  own 
family.  Her  uncle  Leopold  was  one  of  her  guardians. 
He  and  her  mother  had  probably  from  her  infancy  selected 
her  future  husband, — her  cousin,  Prince  Albert  of  Saxe- 
Coburg-Gotha,  —  and  this  young  Prince,  under  King 
Leopold's  advice  and  superintendence,  was  put  in  training 
at  a  very  early  age  for  his  future  important  position. 

King  William  IV.  exceedingly  disliked  the  Duchess  of 
Kent,  and  on  several  occasions  treated  her  with  rudeness 
altogether  unbecoming  a  gentleman.  In  emergencies  she 
seems  to  have  relied  on  the  advice  of  the  Duke  of 
Wellington. 

When  her  daughter  came  to  the  throne  she  retired  as 
much  as  possible  behind  it,  and  after  the  Queen's  marriage 
their  households  became  separated. 

If  any  man  was  ever  cordially  hated,  it  was  Ernest,  the 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  41 

Duke  of  Cumberland.  Popular  opinion  looked  upon  him 
as  a  monster  of  iniquity.  He  was  even  accused  of  murder- 
ing one  of  his  own  attendants,  a  youth  named  Sellis ;  and 
though  the  investigation  seemed  to  establish  the  fact  that  it 
was  Sellis  who  had  tried  to  murder  the  Duke,  and  who, 
when  overpowered,  had  cut  his  own  throat,  it  was  hard  to 
remove  an  impression  of  the  Duke's  guilt  from  the  public 
mind. 

His  wife  had  been  already  twice  married,  —once  to  Prince 
Frederick  of  Prussia,  then  again  to  Prince  Salms,  by  whom 
she  had  had  children,  and  from  whom  she  was  divorced  for 
her  irregularities.  She  was  own  niece  to  Queen  Charlotte, 
having  been  born  a  princess  of  Mecklenburg-Strelitz  ;  but  on 
learning  of  the  divorce,  the  Queen  would  neither  receive 
her  at  court,  nor  acknowledge  her  as  her  daughter-in-law. 

The  dread  throughout  England  was  very  great  lest  the 
young  Victoria  should  die  before  she  was  married  and  had 
had  children,  as  tnen  the  Duke  of  Cumberland  would  have 
mounted  the  English  throne.  Hanover,  however,  was  a 
kingdom  that  had  a  Salic  law,  so  that  when  William  IV. 
died  the  Duke  succeeded  him  as  its  sovereign,  —  to  the 
great  joy  of  Englishmen,  who  were  relieved  at  his  depar- 
ture. They  were  also  glad  to  get  rid  of  the  connection 
with  Hanover,  looking  upon  it  as  the  exciting  cause  of 
Continental  wars. 

King  Ernest  of  Hanover  had  one  son,  blind  from  his 
youth,  and  as  good  and  well-beloved  as  his  father  was 
the  contrary.  He  was  very  musical.  He  became  King 
George  V.  of  Hanover  after  his  father's  death,  resisted  the 
encroachments  of  Prussia  in  1866,  fought  bravely  in  the 
battle  of  Langensala,  where  his  Hanoverians  distinguished 
themselves,  but  was  finally  deposed  by  Prussia's  irresistible 
power. 

He  had  three  children,  —  two  daughters,  and  one  son. 
The  son  has  married  Princess  Thyra  of  Denmark,  sister  of  the 
Princess  of  Wales  and  of  the  Empress  of  Russia.  The  eld- 
est daughter  of  the  blind  King  married,  after  her  father's 
death,  the  nobleman  who  had  served  him  as  private  secre- 


42      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

tary,  with  the  full  consent  of  Queen  Victoria,  as  head  of  the 
family.  There  is  a  lovely  account  of  this  lady,  under  a 
slightly  disguised  name,  in  Daudet's  novel,  "  Les  Rois  en 
Exil." 

Augustus  Frederick,  the  Duke  of  Sussex,  had  a  somewhat 
singular  history.  He  was  the  handsomest,  the  best-educated, 
the  most  liberal-minded  and  popular  prince  of  his  family. 
Early  in  George  III.'s  reign  the  King,  in  consequence  of 
the  marriage  of  his  two  brothers  with  ladies  not  of  princely 
birth,  favored  the  passage  of  an  Act  of  Parliament  called 
the  Royal  Marriage  Act.  By  it  no  descendant  of  George  II.1 
(sic)  can  contract  a  legal  marriage  without  the  consent  of 
the  sovereign,  if  less  than  twenty-five  years  of  age.  If 
over  that  age,  and  he  cannot  obtain  the  consent  of  the 
sovereign,  notice  of  an  intention  to  marry  may  be  given  to 
the  Privy  Council,  and  at  the  end  of  twelve  months  after 
this  notice,  if  no  objection  has  been  made  by  Parliament, 
the  marriage  may  take  place,  —  always  providing  that  the 
bride  or  bridegroom  shall  be  a  Protestant.  This  law,  until 
recently,  has  restricted  English  royal  marriages  to  a  very 
few  German  Protestant  princely  families.  In  England  the 
prejudice  against  these  German  marriages  has  been  intense. 
To  this  day  it  is  understood  that  children  in  various 
branches  of  the  royal  family  speak  German  rather  than 
English  among  themselves. 

To  return,  however,  to  the  Duke  of  Sussex.  When  the 
American  Revolutionary  War  broke  out,  the  Governor  of 
Virginia  was  Lord  Dunmore.  He  escaped,  with  his  family, 
on  board  an  English  frigate,  and  on  reaching  England 
went  down  to  his  Scottish  castle  and  estate.  He  had  a 
very  attractive  family.  One  of  his  daughters,  Lady  Augusta 
Murray,  was  in  Rome  with  her  mother  in  the  winter  of 
1792.  There  the  Duke  of  Sussex,  then  a  very  young  man, 
met  her,  fell  desperately  in  love  with  her,  and  succeeded 
in  persuading  an  English  clergyman,  in  spite  of  the  Royal 
Marriage  Act,  to  perform  the  marriage  ceremony.  This 

1  How  far  the  innumerable  German  descendants  of  George  II. 
continue  to  feel  themselves  bound  by  this  law  I  am  unable  to  say. 


THE  FAMILY  OF  GEORGE  III.  43 

was  repeated  some  months  after  in  St.  George's,  Han- 
over Square,  the  banns  of  Augusta  Murray  and  Augustus 
Frederick  having  been  three  times  previously  published, 
without  attracting  attention.  Two  children  were  born  of 
this  marriage,  —  Sir  Augustus  d'Este,  and  his  sister,  Made- 
moiselle d'Este,  who  married  Lord  Truro,  subsequently 
Lord  Chancellor. 

The  Duke  and  Lady  Augusta  were  descended  from 
common  royal  ancestors,  in  three  different  royal  lines. 
Both  claimed  descent  from  James  II.,  King  of  Scotland, 
one  by  the  male  line,  the  other  by  the  female.  Again, 
while  the  Duke  descended  from  Margaret,  sister  of  Henry 
VIII.,  Lady  Augusta  had  for  her  ancestress  his  other  sister, 
Mary.  Both  claimed  descent  from  Louis  I.,  Duke  of 
Montpensier,  and  from  Charles  VII.  of  France,  and,  both 
being  descended  from  the  house  of  D'Este,  they  adopted 
that  as  the  family  name  of  their  children. 

As  soon  as  George  III.  learned  the  fact  of  the  marriage, 
he  took  measures  to  have  it  declared  null  and  void.  The 
Duke  of  Sussex  vehemently  protested  against  this  for  some 
years,  and  stood  up  in  defence  of  his  wife,  but  eventually 
he  weakened.  Lady  Augusta  was  created  Countess  of 
Ameland;  but  in  1809  she  was  forced  to  give  up  her  chil- 
dren, on  the  ground  that  she  "  was  bringing  them  up  with 
an  idea  that  they  were  princes  and  princesses."  Troubles 
arising  out  of  her  unhappy  marriage  lasted  till  her  death, 
which  took  place  in  1830.  Not  long  afterwards,  the  Duke, 
then  an  old  man,  and  still  in  search  of  domestic  happiness, 
in  spite  of  the  Royal  Marriage  Act  married  Lady  Cecilia 
Underwood.  She  was  ninth  daughter  of  the  Earl  of 
Arran,  and  was  born  Lady  Cecilia  Gore ;  but  she  had 
married  Sir  George  Buggin,  a  London  alderman,  and  on 
becoming  a  widow,  in  1825,  had  obtained  leave  to  change 
the  name  of  Buggin  to  her  mother's  name  of  Underwood. 

In  1840  she  was  acknowledged  by  Queen  Victoria  and 
by  Lord  Melbourne's  ministry  to  be  the  lawful  wife  of  the 
Duke  of  Sussex,  though  not  entitled  to  share  his  rank.  She 
was  created  Duchess  of  Inverness  in  her  own  right,  and  was 


44     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

devoted  in  her  attentions  to  her  husband.  He  was  Pres- 
ident of  the  Royal  Society,  a  fatherly  uncle  to  the  Queen, 
a  patron  of  literature  and  science,  an  inordinate  smoker, 
and  the  owner  of  a  library  especially  rich  in  valuable 
Bibles.  The  world  had  nothing  to  say  against  him,  except 
that  he  made  debts,  as  all  his  brothers  did,  and  died 
without  paying  them. 

There  is  little  to  be  said  about  Adolphus,  Duke  of  Cam- 
bridge. His  brother,  while  Prince  Regent  and  George  IV., 
kept  him  nearly  always  in  Hanover,  where  he  governed  as 
viceroy. 

I  have  seen  him  sometimes  at  the  Opera,  —  a  rubicund, 
stout  man,  with  a  silly  and  resounding  laugh.  He  had 
three  children,  —  George,  now  Duke  of  Cambridge,  and 
Commander-in-Chief  of  the  British  Army ;  Augusta,  who  is 
Grand  Duchess  of  Mecklenburg- Strelitz ;  and  Mary,  a  great 
favorite  of  the  English  public,  who  married  Prince  Teck, 
a  German  without  dominions,  who  since  his  marriage  has 
led  the  life  of  an  English  country  gentleman.  It  is  their 
daughter,  Princess  Mary,  now  Duchess  of  York,  great- 
great-granddaughter  of  George  III.,  who  is  likely  some- 
time during  the  coming  century  to  take  her  place  as  Queen 
Consort  on  the  English  throne. 

It  has  been  noticed  that  "  in  most  of  the  male  members 
of  George  III.'s  immediate  family,  who  all  had  good  abil- 
ities, there  was  a  certain  strain  of  folly  or  eccentricity, 
owing  a  good  deal  to  unrestrained  self-indulgence  and  love 
of  pleasure,  which  led  to  debt  and  difficulties,  which  in 
their  turn  led  to  abandonment  of  principle,  to  strange 
shifts,  to  careless  oddities  and  recklessness." 


CHAPTER  II. 

GEORGE    IV. MRS.    FITZHERBERT. PRINCESS    CHARLOTTE. 

"T^EW  persons  in  our  own  day  have  a  good  word  to  say 
•*~      for  the  last  of  the  four  Georges. 

There  were  some  loyal  souls  during  his  lifetime  (like 
dear  Sir  Walter  Scott)  who  genuinely  believed  in  "  the 
divinity  that  doth  hedge  a  king,"  and  persuaded  themselves 
into  esteeming  him  accordingly.  But  in  his  lifetime  all  con- 
temporary memoir-writers  and  journal-keepers  spoke  of  him 
disparagingly ;  his  brothers,  who  knew  him  best,  had,  with 
their  familiars,  none  but  words  of  insolence  to  say  of  him, 
—  indeed,  their  satire  is  so  fierce  that  it  awakens  a  thrill 
of  sympathy  for  their  victim.  Here  are  some  of  Byron's 
celebrated  lines,  written  on  the  opening  of  the  Royal 
Vaults  at  Windsor  :  — 

"  Famed  for  their  civil  and  domestic  brawls, 
Here  heartless  Henry  lies  by  headless  Charles. 
Between  them  stands  another  sceptered  thing,  — 
It  lives,  it  moves,  in  all  but  name  a  king. 
Charles  to  his  people,  —  Henry  to  his  wife,  — 
In  him  the  double  tyrant  starts  to  life. 
Justice  and  Death  have  mixed  their  dust  in  vain, 
Each  royal  vampire  wakes  to  life  again  I 
Ah  I  what  can  tombs  avail  when  these  disgorge 
Two  such  to  make  a  Regent  in  a  George  ? " 

Dickens  has  had  his  fling  at  George  IV.'s  meanness,  sel- 
fishness, and  pomposity,  in  the  character  of  Mr.  Turvey- 
drop ;  while  Thackeray,  not  content  with  sticking  his  steel 
pen  through  him,  and  holding  him  up  to  infamy,  in  the 
"  Four  Georges,"  gives  us  one  of  the  keenest  bits  of  irony 
in  the  English  language,  when  he  describes  him  as  he  saw 


46      ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

him  at  the  theatre  soon  after  he  returned  from  India,  as 
"  George,  the  First  Gentleman  of  Europe ;  George  the 
Good;  George  the  Great  and  the  Magnificent,"  bowing 
to  his  lieges. 

Peace  be  to  his  ashes  !  There  were  three  things  to  be 
said  in  his  favor,  —  he  disliked  signing  death-warrants 
(which  were  very  plenty  in  his  reign),  and  often  wretched 
criminals  escaped  the  gallows  through  his  mercy.  Moore's 
description  of  him  at  his  breakfast-table,  with  — 

"  Tea  and  toast, 
Death-warrants  and  the  '  Morning  Post/' 

was  more  witty  than  justifiable.  He  had  elegant  manners 
and  wore  an  elegant  wig,  though  the  deportment  was  as 
artificial  as  the  other.  He  was  also  more  sinned  against 
than  sinning  in  his  personal  relations  to  the  crew  of  witty 
rascals  that  in  his  early  years  he  gathered  round  him.  He 
was  good  to  Sheridan,  who  rewarded  him  with  ingratitude ; 
and  he  left  behind  him  a  paper  excusing  himself  for  many 
of  the  errors  of  his  life  by  pleading  the  anomalous  nature  of 
his  position. 

11  The  duties  of  life,"  he  says,  "  are  easy  to  most  men,  —  they 
fit  them  like  a  glove.  Mine  did  not  fit  so  well,  nor  so  softly.  I 
was  blessed  with  a  father,  mother,  and  wife,  each  and  all  of 
whom  were  certainly  the  most  intolerable  persons  that  even 
fiction  could  present.  .  .  .  One  of  the  great  weaknesses  of  con- 
stitutional government  is  the  impossibility  of  friendship  or  accord 
between  a  sovereign  who  thinks  for  himself,  and  any  minister 
who  does  the  same.  No  king  may  form  a  friendship  founded 
on  politics.  After  friendship  and  politics  comes  friendship 
and  dissipation, — a  sorry  link,  yet  a  strong  one.  Friends  of 
that  kind  had  to  be  sought  in  men  strangers  to  politics,  other- 
wise ministers  would  be  jealous,  —  imagine  plots,  backstairs 
influence,  and  so  on.  I  never  had  but  one  exception,  —  Sheri- 
dan ;  and  yet  what  scrapes  did  he  not  get  me  into  !  One  great 
accusation  against  me  was  that  I  failed  to  provide  sufficiently 
and  honorably  for  such  friends  as  were  ruined  by  their  own  im- 
prudence ;  but  if  the  King  of  England  wanted  a  small  place  of 
two  or  three  hundred  pounds  a  year  for  a  friend,  he  might  go 
begging  for  it,  and  not  find  it.  It  took  me  far  less  pains  to  get 


KING    GEORGE   IV. 


GEORGE  IV,  47 

Lord  Moira  made  Governor-General  of  India  than  it  did  to  get 
Moore  the  poor  clerkship  in  Bermuda  which  ruined  him.  Again, 
with  regard  to  marriage:  It  is  said  I  married,  or  consented  to 
be  married,  only  that  my  debts  might  be  paid  ;  that  I  had  be- 
forehand determined  to  quarrel  with  and  discard  the  Princess  of 
Brunswick.  Is  it  not  more  natural  and  proper  to  suppose  that 
in  my  position  I  may  have  desired  heirs  to  the  English  throne, 
and  had  made  up  my  resolve  for  the  duties  as  well  as  the  pleas- 
ures and  advantages  of  matrimony  ?  that,  compelled  to  espouse 
what  I  had  never  seen  or  known,  I  was  still,  as  a  gentleman  ot 
honor,  prepared  to  reciprocate  every  generous,  every  loving, 
every  delicate  sentiment?  Is  it  not  possible  that  I  may  have 
been  disappointed  ?  " 

George  IV.  was  born  in  London,  Aug.  12,  1762,  and 
was  christened  George  Augustus  Frederick.  He  and  his 
brothers,  York,  Clarence,  and  Kent,  were  educated  in  great 
privacy  and  under  extremely  severe  discipline.  Till  he  was 
eighteen  he  led  a  dreary  life  of  almost  entire  seclusion  at 
Buckingham  House,  Kew,  or  Windsor.  The  ordinary  recre- 
ations of  his  age  had  been  so  utterly  denied  him  that  when 
at  eighteen  he  attained  the  usual  majority  of  princes,  he 
at  once  gave  way  to  all  kinds  of  riotous  excesses.  Gam- 
bling, horse-racing,  and  all  sorts  of  disreputable  pleasures 
occupied  his  time,  and  led  him  into  the  society  of  vicious 
persons. 

The  French  Duke  of  Orleans  (afterwards  Philippe 
Egalite"),  the  most  advanced  blackguard  of  his  age,  was 
one  of  his  intimates;  also  Fox,  Sheridan,  and  Erskine, 
then  leaders  of  the  Whig  party,  and  of  fast  London  life. 
Those  were  the  days  when  Colonel  Byrd,  of  Westover,  Vir- 
ginia, and  other  gentlemen  of  the  old  Virginia  school,  half 
ruined  themselves  by  high  play  with  His  Royal  Highness. 
On  one  occasion,  when  Colonel  Byrd  had  lost  heavily  over 
night,  he  received  a  message  in  the  morning  from  the  Prince 
that  half  the  debt  would  be  enough  to  settle  the  account 
between  them  ;  to  which  the  Colonel  replied  promptly  that 
a  Virginia  gentleman  never  staked  more  than  he  could  afford 
to  pay. 

George    III.    was    distressed    and    scandalized   by   the 


48     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

excesses  of  his  prodigal,  nor  was  he  soothed  by  the  Prince's 
openly  joining  himself  with  the  Whig  party,  which  was 
opposed  to  Mr.  Pitt,  and  professed  to  be  in  sympathy  with 
the  French  Revolution. 

King  George  was  himself  an  enemy  to  every  kind  of  pro- 
gress, a  conservative  of  the  strictest  kind.  He  refused  to 
sanction  any  proper  income  for  his  son,  though  Parliament 
was  ready  to  grant  the  Prince  of  Wales  ^100,000  per 
annum. 

At  the  age  of  nineteen  the  Prince  met  a  Roman  Catholic 
lady,  Mrs.  Fitzherbert.  She  was  six  years  older  than  him- 
self, and  was  the  daughter  of  William  Smythe,  a  Hamp- 
shire gentleman.  At  nineteen  she  had  married  Mr.  Weld 
of  Lulworth  Castle,  one  of  the  same  Weld  family  since  well 
known  in  America.  Mr.  Weld  died  in  a  few  months.  His 
widow  aftenvards  married  Mr.  Fitzherbert,  of  Staffordshire  ; 
he  died  in  consequence  of  over-exerting  himself  in  the 
cause  of  law  and  order  during  Lord  George  Gordon's  No- 
Popery  Riots,  in  1 780,  so  graphically  described  in  "  Barnaby 
Rudge." 

At  twenty-five,  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  was  a  beautiful  young 
widow,  rich,  courted,  and  admired.  Here,  in  the  language 
of  a  writer  in  one  of  the  English  magazines,  is  what 
followed  :  — 

"  George,  the  fat  and  fair  young  prince,  already  wearied  of 
Mrs.  Robinson,  his  poor  Perdita,  saw  the  brilliant  young 
beauty.  His  heart  was  (as  he  said)  seriously  affected.  The 
fair  widow  divided  his  affections  with  the  bottle,  and  he  became 
an  assiduous  wooer,  whom  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  endeavored  as 
assiduously  to  avoid.  Her  coyness  did  but  inflame  his 
ardor.  But  she  remained  deaf  to  all  entreaty,  till  Keit,  the 
surgeon,  Lord  Onslow,  Lord  Southampton,  and  Mr  Edward 
Bouverie  arrived  one  night  at  her  house  in  the  utmost  con- 
sternation, informing  her  that  the  life  of  the  Prince  was  in 
imminent  danger,  that  he  had  stabbed  himself,  and  that  only  her 
immediate  presence  could  save  him. 

"  There  probably  never  was  a  man  so  ridiculous  when  play- 
ing the  part  of  a  lover  as  the  Prince  of  Wales.  To  have 
himself  bled  that  he  might  make  himself  look  interesting  for  a 


MRS.   FITZHERBERT.  49 

moment  in  the  eyes  of  some  fair  lady,  was  no  unusual  trick 
with  him.  On  this  occasion,  however,  it  was  positively  declared 
that  he  had  stabbed  himself,  and  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  believed  it 
to  the  day  of  her  death.  Meanwhile  the  four  male  emissaries 
of  love  besought  the  young  widow  to  hasten  and  heal  the 
wound.  They  succeeded  in  persuading  her,  after  much  difficulty, 
and  she  went  to  his  residence  at  Carlton  House,  accompanied 
by  the  Duchess  of  Devonshire.  When  she  reached  the 
Prince's  bedside  she  found  him  pale  and  covered  with  blood. 
The  Prince  told  her  that  nothing  would  induce  him  to  live 
unless  she  promised  to  become  his  wife,  and  let  him  put  a  ring 
on  her  finger." 

She  yielded ;  but  the  next  day  grew  frightened,  and 
repented.  A  narrative  was  drawn  up  of  what  had  passed  ; 
those  who  had  been  present  signed  it  as  witnesses,  and 
Mrs.  Fitzherbert,  declaring  that  she  had  not  been  a  free 
agent,  fled  beyond  the  seas.  While  abroad  she  became 
intimate  with  the  Princess  of  Orange,  who  at  that  time  was 
spoken  of  as  the  future  Princess  of  Wales. 

The  rage  and  grief  of  the  Prince  drove  him  to  madness. 
There  must  have  been  incipient  insanity  in  his  composition. 
Lord  Holland,  on  the  testimony  of  Mr.  Fox,  says  that  "  he 
cried  by  the  hour ;  he  testified  the  sincerity  and  violence 
of  his  despair  by  extravagant  expressions  and  actions,  — 
rolling  on  the  floor,  striking  his  forehead,  tearing  his  hair, 
falling  into  hysterics,  and  swearing  that  he  would  abandon 
the  country,  forego  the  crown,  etc." 

Mrs.  Fitzherbert  remained  a  year  on  the  Continent, 
"endeavoring,"  as  she  says,  "to  fight  off"  the  perilous 
honor  that  was  persistently  pressed  upon  her.  Love- 
letters  from  the  Prince  followed  her  in  such  numbers  that 
the  French  Government  of  that  day  fancied  they  were  con- 
nected with  some  intrigue  on  the  part  of  the  Duke  of 
Orleans  (Chartres  at  that  period),  and  arrested  two  of  the 
couriers.  At  last  a  love-letter  of  twenty-seven  pages,  in 
which  the  Prince  assured  her  that  the  King,  his  father, 
would  connive  at  the  marriage,  decided  her.  She  came 
to  England,  and  at  the  same  port  where  she  landed  was 
married  to  the  Prince  by  a  clergyman  of  the  Church  of 

4 


5<D      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

England,  in  the  presence  of  several  witnesses,  among  them 
her  cousin  and  her  brother.  The  certificate  of  this  mar- 
riage is  in  existence  in  the  handwriting  of  the  Prince ;  but 
Mrs.  Fitzherbert  afterwards  cut  out  the  names  of  the 
witnesses,  for  fear  of  bringing  them  into  trouble. 

For  some  years  the  couple  lived  together  as  man  and 
wife,  and  then,  the  Prince's  debts  getting  intolerable,  he 
applied  to  Parliament  for  money.  In  the  course  of  the 
debate  that  followed,  reference  was  made  to  his  illegal  mar- 
riage, when  he  desired  his  personal  friend,  Mr.  Fox,  utterly 
to  deny  that  he  ever  had  been  married.  At  this  Mrs.  Fitz- 
herbert was  naturally  so  indignant  that  her  lying  husband 
had  to  get  Sheridan,  another  friend,  to  make  a  counter- 
speech,  in  which  he  reproached  Mr.  Fox  for  having  said 
anything  to  the  disparagement  of  a  lady  "  whose  good 
name,  malice  or  ignorance  alone  could  attempt  to  injure, 
and  whose  conduct  and  character  were  worthy  of  the 
truest  respect." 

Though  of  course,  in  the  face  of  the  Royal  Marriage  Act, 
the  marriage  ceremony  did  not  constitute  the  union  of  the 
heir-apparent  with  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  a  legal  marriage,  society 
believed  in  her,  and  she  was  received  everywhere.  Even 
old  Queen  Charlotte  was  kind  to  her,  and  George  III.  was 
her  warm  friend. 

The  pecuniary  difficulties  of  the  Prince  marred  the  hap- 
piness of  their  union.  At  one  time,  animated  by  a  desire 
to  show  the  world  how  mean  he  considered  the  allowance 
made  him  by  his  father,  the  Prince  sold  his  carriages,  vacated 
Carlton  House,  and  assumed  the  character  of  a  penniless 
prodigal.  This  lasted,  however,  only  a  few  months.  The 
pair  quarrelled  several  times,  but  made  up  again.  In  1 793, 
after  ten  years  of  comparative  constancy,  the  Prince  trans- 
ferred his  assiduities  to  Lady  Jersey.  In  1794,  as  Mrs.  Fitz- 
herbert was  seated  at  the  dinner-table  of  the  Duke  of 
Clarence,  a  note  was  brought  her.  In  it  her  husband  bade 
her  farewell,  saying  that  it  was  decided  he  must  be  married 
to  his  cousin,  Princess  Caroline  of  Brunswick. 

After  this  marriage  Mrs.  Fitzherbert,  by  the  advice  of  her 


MRS.   FITZHERBERT.  51 

friends,  opened  her  house  in  a  series  of  brilliant  parties. 
All  the  fashionable  society  of  London,  including  the  royal 
princes,  attended  her  balls. 

"  Upon  this,  as  upon  all  other  occasions,"  says  her  friend 
and  biographer,  Lord  Stourton,  "  she  was  principally  sup- 
ported by  the  Duke  of  York,  with  whom  through  life  she  was 
always  united  in  the  most  friendly  and  confidential  relations. 
Indeed,"  he  continues,  "  she  frequently  assured  me  that 
there  was  not  one  of  the  royal  family  who  had  not  acted 
with  kindness  towards  her ;  and  as  for  George  III.,  from 
the  time  she  returned  to  England  till  his  mind  was  clouded 
by  insanity,  had  he  been  her  own  father  he  could  not  have 
acted  towards  her  with  greater  kindness  and  affection.  She 
had  made  it  a  rule  to  have  no  secrets  of  which  the  royal 
family  were  not  informed  by  frequent  messages,  of  which 
the  Duke  of  York  was  generally  the  organ  of  communi- 
cation ;  and  to  that  rule  she  attributed  at  all  times  much 
of  her  own  contentment  and  ease  in  extricating  herself 
from  embarrassments  which  would  otherwise  have  been 
insurmountable." 

After  the  Prince  Regent's  alienation  and  separation  from 
his  wife,  the  Princess  Caroline,  he  resumed  the  same  desper- 
ate courtship  of  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  as  she  had  been  exposed 
to  a  dozen  years  before.  Members  of  the  royal  family, 
male  and  female,  urged  her  to  forgive  his  political  marriage, 
and  to  receive  him  again  as  her  husband. 

Doubtful  as  to  what  might  be  right  under  such  extraor- 
dinary circumstances,  she  despatched  one  of  the  chaplains 
at  the  Spanish  Chapel  (the  principal  Roman  Catholic  place 
of  worship  then  in  London)  to  Rome,  to  ask  the  advice  of 
the  Pope  and  Council.  The  reply  from  Rome  was  in  a 
Brief.  At  that  day  it  was  against  the  law  to  bring  a  Pope's 
Brief  into  England,  and  this  one  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  afterwards, 
in  a  moment  of  panic,  destroyed.  The  Pope's  decision  was 
that  she  was  in  truth  the  Prince's  wife,  and  should  return  to 
him.  She  did  so,  receiving  him,  not  clandestinely,  but  inviting 
him  to  a  breakfast  at  her  own  house,  with  all  the  fashionable 
world  of  London. 


52     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  The  next  years,  she  told  me,"  says  Lord  Stourton,  "  were 
the  happiest  of  her  connection  with  the  Prince.  She  used  to 
say  they  were  extremely  poor,  but  as  merry  as  crickets  ;  and  as 
a  proof  of  their  poverty,  she  told  me  that  once,  on  their  returning 
from  Brighton  to  London,  they  mustered  their  common  means, 
and  could  not  raise  five  pounds  between  them.  She  added,  how- 
ever, that  even  this  period,  the  happiest  of  their  lives,  was  much 
embittered  by  the  numerous  political  difficulties  that  beset  the 
Prince,  and  especially  by  all  that  concerned  the  '  delicate  inves- 
tigation,' as  it  was  proper  to  call  the  inquiry  into  the  conduct 
of  the  Princess  of  Wales.  That  lady  did  not  hesitate  in  the 
coarsest  manner  to  allude  to  the  Prince  as  '  Mrs.  Fitzherbert's 
husband.' " 

At  last  the  Prince's  wandering  fancy  for  other  ladies  of 
the  court  led  to  their  final  separation. 

After  Queen's  Caroline's  death,  and  when  the  Prince  at 
last  was  King  of  England,  he  announced  to  Mrs.  Fitzherbert 
his  intention  of  marrying  again  ;  to  which  she  only  replied, 
"  Very  well,  sir." 

In  conjunction  with  Queen  Charlotte,  the  Duke  of  York 
obtained  for  Mrs.  Fitzherbert,  by  a  mortgage  on  George  IV. 's 
plaything,  the  Pavilion  at  Brighton,  ^6000  a  year.  Her 
influence  with  the  old  King  George  III.  had  been  so  great 
that  on  one  occasion,  even  when  she  was  separated  from 
the  Prince,  she  obtained  from  him  a  promise  to  treat  his 
son  with  more  kindness.  Soon  after  their  final  separation, 
the  Prince  Regent  consulted  her  as  to  how  he  should  act  in 
a  political  emergency.  She  gave  him  excellent  advice,  — 
to  act  honestly.  He  of  course  did  exactly  the  reverse. 

When,  in  spite  of  his  usual  regard  for  children,  he  was 
treating  his  daughter,  Princess  Charlotte,  with  extraordinary 
harshness,  the  poor  girl  threw  herself  on  the  neck  of  Mrs. 
Fitzherbert,  and  implored  her  to  beseech  her  father  to  be 
less  unkind.  But  when  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  urged  on  the  Prince 
the  moral  and  political  necessity  for  less  harshness,  his  only 
reply  was,  "  So  that  is  your  opinion,  madam." 

When  he  was  on  his  death-bed,  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  wrote 
him  a  touching  letter,  as  from  a  wife  offering  her  services  to 
her  sick  husband.  He  read  the  letter,  not  without  emotion, 


AfRS.    FITZHERBERT. 


MKS    F1TZHERBERT.  53 

and  he  died  and  was  buried  with  her  portrait  hung  about 
his  neck  by  a  little  silver  chain. 

On  the  accession  of  William  IV.,  Mrs.  Fitzherbert  applied 
for  an  interview  with  him,  and  laid  before  the  new  sovereign 
all  the  documents  relating  to  her  marriage.  He  was  moved 
to  tears  by  the  perusal,  and  expressed  his  surprise  at  her 
forbearance,  with  such  papers  in  her  possession,  and  under 
the  pressure  of  such  long  and  severe  trials.  He  offered  to 
make  her  some  amends  by  creating  her  a  Duchess ;  but  she 
replied  that  she  did  not  wish  for  any  rank,  that  she  had 
borne  through  life  the  name  of  Mrs.  Fitzherbert,  and  had 
done  nothing  to  disgrace  it.  She  was  admitted  to  the  private 
family  circle  of  King  William  and  Queen  Adelaide,  and 
always,  when  they  stayed  at  Brighton,  where  she  lived, 
attended  their  small  Sunday  parties. 

She  destroyed  all  her  papers,  except  a  few  documents 
which  she  sealed  up,  and  which  now  lie  unopened  in  the 
bank  of  Messrs.  Coutts  in  London.  The  Duke  of  Wellington 
and  Lord  Albemarle  assisted  her  in  the  destruction  of  the 
most  important  of  her  papers. 

She  passed  the  last  years  of  her  life  entirely  at  Brighton, 
and  died  in  1837,  the  year  Queen  Victoria  came  to  the 
throne.  King  William  had  desired  her  to  adopt  for  her 
servants  the  royal  livery,  and  had  authorized  her  to  wear 
widow's  mourning  for  his  brother. 

To  return  to  George  IV.,  in  his  earlier  days.  For  years 
as  Prince  of  Wales  he  was  on  bad  terms  with  his  parents. 
His  reckless  extravagance,  his  disreputable  habits,  his  con- 
tempt of  respectability,  his  politics,  and  his  private  life  were 
distasteful  alike  to  the  old  King  and  Queen. 

In  those  days,  when  Europe  was  on  the  eve  of  great 
changes  in  public  thought,  when  ardent  spirits,  not  fore- 
seeing the  Reign  of  Terror,  hailed  the  coming  Revolution, 
England  was  divided  into  the  old  Tory  party,  led  by 
Mr.  Pitt,  who  took  for  their  war-cry,  "  King,  Church,  and 
Constitution,"  and  the  Whigs,  led  by  Mr.  Fox,  who 
were  supposed  to  have  imbibed  the  principles  of  Rous- 
seau and  the  Revolution. 


54      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

The  Prince  on  coming  of  age  (as  Princes  „  do  at 
eighteen)  conceived  a  great  admiration  for  Mr.  Fox,  and 
entered  into  close  personal  relations  with  him,  his  party 
being  in  opposition  to  the  King's  ministers.  In  November, 
1 7,88,  the  King's  insanity  forced  Parliament  to  meet  the 
question  of  a  regency ;  and  after  many  intrigues  and  much 
fierce  debate,  members  decided  that  it  should  be  offered  to 
the  Prince  of  Wales,  with  certain  restrictions,  one  of  which 
limited  his  power  over  the  King's  person  and  over  the 
other  members  of  the  royal  family ;  for  Queen  Charlotte 
and  her  daughters  had  a  great  dread  of  falling  into  the 
hands  of  such  a  brother  and  such  a  son.  But  before  the 
bill  came  into  effect,  the  King  suddenly  recovered  his 
reason.  The  spirit  that  the  Prince  of  Wales  had  manifested 
towards  his  father  and  mother  during  the  discussion  of  the 
Regency  Bill  so  shocked  public  feeling  in  London  that 
the  mob  made  demonstrations  against  him,  while  rejoicing 
in  the  old  King's  recovery.  Perhaps  I  am  wrong  to  speak 
of  him  as  "  the  old  King,"  for  in  1 788  George  III.  was 
barely  fifty  years  old. 

After  1 792  the  Prince  gradually  ceased  to  be  a  Whig,  and 
before  long  tried  to  win  the  favor  and  confidence  of  Mr. 
Pitt  and  the  Tories.  This  turning  of  his  coat  is  not  so 
much  to  his  discredit  as  it  at  first  appears,  for  by  1797  Mr. 
Fox  had  withdrawn  himself  from  politics,  and  the  French 
Revolution  had  disgusted  and  disheartened  the  friends  who 
had  welcomed  it  with  enthusiasm  a  few  years  before. 

In  1794  the  Prince  (as  I  have  told  already),  in  order  to 
obtain  the  second  payment  of  his  debts,  and  a  larger  income 
from  Parliament,  intimated  his  willingness  to  marry  any  lady 
of  royal  birth  selected  for  him.  The  one  chosen  was  his 
cousin,  Princess  Caroline  of  Brunswick.  Referring  to  Mrs. 
Fitzherbert,  Queen  Charlotte  said,  when  informed  of  the 
probability  of  this  marriage,  "  George  best  knows  whether 
he  can  reconcile  it  to  his  conscience  to  marry." 

Lord  Malmesbury,  a  trained  diplomatist,  was  sent  over  to 
Brunswick  to  bring  the  young  lady  to  England.  The  reve- 
lations jotted  down  in  his  journal  day  by  day  are  very  frank 
and  very  amusing. 


CAROLINE   OF  BRUNSWICK.  55 

"Princess  Caroline  of  Brunswick,"  he  says,  "while  endowed 
by  nature  with  a  kind  heart,  and  some  quickness  of  apprehen- 
sion, was  as  ineligible  a  person  as  could  have  been  selected  for 
the  consort  of  the  future  King  of  Great  Britain.  Her  education 
had  been  wretchedly  neglected,  she  was  vain,  giddy,  and  impru- 
dent, addicted  to  the  society  of  persons  infinitely  below  her  own 
rank,  whom  she  treated  with  unbecoming  familiarity,  totally 
ignorant  of  the  world  and  its  usages,  and  unable  to  control  her 
tongue.  She  stood  in  awe  of  her  father,  who  was  an  austere 
person,  and  who  treated  his  children  habitually,  it  was  said,  with 
much  severity.  For  her  mother  she  had  no  respect,  and  did  not 
scruple,  when  she  could  find  an  opportunity,  —  which  occurred 
only  too  often,  —  to  turn  her  into  ridicule.  Her  conversation  was 
that  of  a  thorough  gossip,  — her  manners  those  of  a  flirt.  She 
was  disposed  to  be  liberal,  not  from  generosity,  but  from  abso- 
lute carelessness,  —  a  fault  she  extends  to  her  person." 

Subsequently  he  writes  while  conducting  her  to  England  : 

"  I  had  two  conversations  with  the  Princess  Caroline,  one  on 
the  toilet,  on  cleanliness,  and  delicacy  of  speaking.  On  these 
points  I  endeavored,  as  far  as  was  possible  for  a  man,  to  incul- 
cate the  necessity  of  great  and  nice  attention  to  every  part  of 
dress,  as  well  to  what  was  hid  as  to  that  which  was  seen.  .  .  . 
It  is  amazing  how  on  this  point  her  education  has  been  neglected, 
and  how  much  her  mother,  though  an  Englishwoman,  has  been 
inattentive  to  it." 

Was  ever  an  unfortunate  ambassador,  a  man  of  courts  and 
councils,  sent  on  such  an  embassy?  He  was  required  to  act 
the  part  of  Mentor  to  this  vulgar,  ignorant,  headstrong  girl, 
—  by  no  means  in  her  first  youth,  —  elated  by  the  promo- 
tion held  out  to  her,  and  absolutely  beyond  his  control.  He 
sums  up  her  character  as  that  of  one  "  who,  in  the  hands  of 
a  steady  and  sensible  man,  would  probably  turn  out  well ; 
but  when  it  is  likely  she  will  meet  with  faults  perfectly  anal- 
ogous to  her  own,  she  must  fail." 

After  a  delay  of  three  months  in  Hanover,  and  consider- 
able difficulty  in  getting  safe  across  the  high  seas  (for  the 
year  was  1795,  and  England  was  at  war  with  the  French 
Republic),  the  Princess  landed  at  Greenwich.  The  Royal 
carriages  had  not  arrived  to  meet  her,  and  she  was  kept 
waiting  for  more  than  an  hour  on  the  landing-place.  They 


56     ENGLAND  IN  THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

at  last  appeared,  and  the  Princess  reached  St.  James's  Palace 
in  the  middle  of  the  afternoon. 

Here  is  Lord  Malmesbury's  account  of  the  Prince's  first 
interview  with  his  bride  :  — 

"  I  notified  our  arrival  to  the  King  and  the  Prince  of  Wales. 
The  last  came  immediately.  I,  according  to  the  established  eti- 
quette, introduced  (no  one  else  being  in  the  room)  the  Princess 
Caroline  to  him.  She  very  properly,  in  consequence  of  my  say- 
ing to  her  that  it  was  the  right  way  of  proceeding,  attempted  to 
kneel  to  him.  He  raised  her  gracefully  enough,  embraced  hen 
said  barely  a  word,  turned  round,  retired  to  a  distant  part  of  the 
room,  and,  calling  me  to  him,  said,  '  Harris,  I  am  not  well ;  pray 
get  me  a  glass  of  brandy.'  I  said,  '  Sir,  had  you  not  better  have 
a  glass  of  water  ? '  Upon  which  he,  much  out  of  humor,  said, 
with  an  oath,  '  No,  I  will  go  directly  to  the  Queen.'  And  away 
he  went.  The  Princess,  left  during  this  short  moment  alone, 
was  in  a  state  of  astonishment,  and,  on  my  rejoining  her,  said, 
*  Mon  Dieu  !  is  the  Prince  always  like  that  ?  He  is  so  fat,  and 
not  nearly  so  handsome  as  his  pictures  ! '  I  endeavored  to  say 
that  his  Royal  Highness  was  naturally  a  good  deal  flurried  and 
affected  by  this  first  interview,  but  she  would  certainly  find  him 
different  at  dinner.'' 

Alas  !  during  that  dinner  the  poor  girl's  conduct  was  flip- 
pant, rattling,  wanting  in  ordinary  delicacy.  The  Prince  was 
evidently  disgusted.  "  And  this  unfortunate  dinner,"  says 
Lord  Malmesbury,  "  fixed  his  dislike,  which,  when  left  to 
herself,  the  Princess  had  not  the  talent  to  remove." 

The  unhappy  pair  were  married  a  few  days  after,  the 
Prince  on  that  occasion  being  civil,  and  not  ungracious, 
though  his  father,  who  stood  behind  him,  had  to  prompt  his 
responses. 

What  could  come  of  such  an  ill-starred  union  but  division 
and  unhappiness? 

Within  a  year  after  the  marriage  the  Princess  gave  birth 
to  a  daughter,  —  the  Princess  Charlotte.  The  wife  and 
husband  (if  wife  and  husband  they  were)  lived  for  some 
months  after  their  child's  birth  under  the  same  roof,  but 
they  never  spoke  to  one  another.  Then  a  formal  separa- 
tion took  place,  and  the  Princess  retired  to  Blackheath. 


CAROLINE   OF  BRUNSWICK.  57 

The  excuse  for  this  ill-treatment  within  a  year  after  the 
marriage  was  simply  that  the  Prince  "  had  taken  a  dislike 
to  her."  The  Lord  Chancellor  Thurlow,  a  man  noted  for 
rough  speech,  said  to  another  nobleman  that  he  thought 
the  Prince's  strange  conduct  could  only  be  imputed  to  mad- 
ness, and  that  he  was  struck  by  the  good  sense  and  discre- 
tion of  the  Princess.  This,  however,  was  not  to  last  long ; 
cast  off  by  her  husband,  friendless  in  a  strange  land,  her 
lady-in-waiting  (Lady  Jersey)  notoriously  the  reigning 
favorite  with  the  Prince,  the  unhappy  woman  became 
reckless.  She  put  no  restraint  on  her  incurably  gamin 
temper,  her  capricious  choice  of  friends,  her  love  of  scan- 
dal and  of  gossip,  her  taste  for  flattery,  and  her  propensity 
to  say  and  do  imprudent  things.  "  People  may  talk,"  she 
said,  "  I  do  not  care  !  From  henceforth  I  will  do  what  I 
please,  —  that  I  will!  " 

She  did  nothing  very  bad,  however,  for  some  years,  when 
a  lady  whose  friendship  she  had  most  imprudently  made, 
and  whom  she  afterwards  discarded,  brought  charges  against 
her  which  were  inquired  into  by  a  Parliamentary  commis- 
sion. This  was  known  by  the  name  of  the  "  delicate  inves- 
tigation ;  "  but  in  spite  of  the  influence  of  the  Prince  of 
Wales,  who  earnestly  hoped  matter  might  be  found  on  which 
to  ground  a  charge  which  must  lead  to  a  divorce,  the 
Princess  was  pronounced  not  guilty  on  the  graver  charges, 
though  cautioned  for  the  future  to  be  more  circumspect.1 

After  1814  the  Princess  went  abroad.  She  wandered 
over  Europe  for  four  years,  living  principally  in  a  villa  on 
the  Lake  of  Como.  The  general  impropriety  of  her  con- 
duct, and  the  relations  that  seemed  to  exist  between  her 
and  her  Italian  chamberlain,  Bergami,  led  all  respectable 
English  people  to  keep  aloof  from  her. 

King  George  III.  had  always  been  kind  to  her,  as  long 

1  My  father,  who  was  home  from  the  Mediterranean  on  sick  leave, 
and  was  staying  at  Blackheath  at  the  time,  has  often  told  me  that  the 
population  of  Blackheath  openly  expressed  opinions  unfavorable  to 
Princess  Caroline ;  but  could  any  serious  charge  have  been  substan- 
tiated, we  may  be  sure  it  would  have  been  taken  advantage  of. 


58      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

as  he  retained  his  reason ;  but  he  lost  it  permanently  in 
1810,  having  been  worried  from  many  causes  into  hopeless 
insanity.  On  his  death,  in  1820,  the  first  act  of  the  new 
King  was  to  forbid  the  insertion  of  his  wife's  name  into  the 
Prayer-book,  where  the  name  of  a  queen  consort  always 
appears  in  the  Litany,  and  in  prayers  for  the  health  and 
welfare  of  the  royal  family.  George  IV.  was  resolved  that 
the  woman  he  hated  should  not  be  prayed  for  by  his  people 
as  Queen  of  England. 

Queen  Caroline  at  once  returned  from  Italy.  The  popu- 
lace of  England,  believing  her  to  be  at  least  as  much  sinned 
against  as  sinning,  took  her  part,  and  made  riotous  demon- 
strations in  her  favor.  King  George  IV.,  whose  daughter, 
Princess  Charlotte,  had  been  dead  for  eighteen  months, 
ardently  wished  for  a  divorce,  that  he  might  make  another 
marriage.  Another  investigation  of  the  Queen's  conduct 
took  place,  not,  this  time,  in  secret,  but  openly  before  the 
House  of  Lords,  during  the  summer  of  1820.  Lord 
Brougham  (then  Henry  Brougham)  was  the  Queen's  coun- 
sel. The  particulars  are  not  edifying,  though  in  those  days 
the  foul  details  were  in  everybody's  mouth. 

The  King  was  not  able  to  obtain  his  divorce,  for  there 
were  no  direct  proofs  of  the  criminality  of  the  Queen,  and 
the  peers,  like  the  people,  seem  to  have  judged  that  how- 
ever bad  the  Queen's  conduct  might  have  been,  that  of  her 
husband  had  been  worse,  and  that  he  was  more  responsible. 
However,  though  she  achieved  a  partial  triumph,  nothing 
would  induce  the  King  to  acknowledge  her  in  any  way  as 
Queen  of  England.  At  the  coronation  she  came  in  her 
robes  and  tried  to  gain  admittance  at  every  door  of  West- 
minster Abbey ;  but  special  guards  had  been  stationed  to 
prevent  her  entrance,  and  she  was  everywhere  refused. 

On  that  occasion  she  stood  for  two  hours  within  a  few 
feet  of  my  mother,  then  a  bride,  who  had  a  seat  in  the  gal- 
lery erected  between  the  Banqueting  Hall  and  the  Abbey. 
Part  of  the  time  she  was  in  tears,  but  more  often  she  acted 
with  an  effrontery  and  a  flippancy  which  greatly  outraged 
my  mother's  sense  of  propriety. 


CAROLINE   OF  BRUNSWICK.  59 

She  did  not  long  survive  this  mortification.  She  died  in 
August  of  the  same  year.  Her  body  was  taken  to  Bruns- 
wick for  burial,  the  populace  attending  it  through  London 
with  riotous  demonstrations  of  sympathy. 

The  remainder  of  George  IV.'s  reign  was  passed  in  quar- 
rels with  his  ministers,  who  in  general  found  it  hard  "  to  get 
along  "  with  him.  He  hated  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  and 
so  did  his  brothers,  the  Dukes  of  York  and  Cumberland. 
The  questions  that  agitated  England  were  that  of  Catho- 
lic Emancipation  and  the  dawning  one  of  Parliamentary 
Reform. 

On  the  accession  of  King  William  and  Queen  Mary,  in 
1688,  such  terror  was  felt  throughout  England  of  Roman 
Catholic  influence  that  the  Test  Act  was  strictly  enforced, 
and  a  new  oath  of  allegiance  was  exacted  besides.  By 
this  Act,  which  was  in  force  until  almost  the  close  of  the 
reign  of  George  IV.,  every  officer  of  the  Crown,  even  down 
to  a  midshipman,  who  desired  a  lieutenant's  commission, 
had  to  take  an  oath  renouncing  all  allegiance  to  the  Pope 
of  Rome,  all  belief  in  transubstantiation  or  the  invocation 
of  saints,  and  also  had  in  public  to  receive  the  Holy  Com- 
munion according  to  the  rites  of  the  Church  of  England. 
This  excluded  conscientious  Roman  Catholics  (and  in 
many  instances  Protestant  Dissenters)  from  serving  their 
King  and  country.  They  could  not  send  their  sons  to  the 
English  universities ;  they  had  to  worship  in  unpretentious 
chapels  in  obscure  places ;  they  could  not  sit  as  magistrates, 
nor  vote  for  members  of  Parliament. 

The  object  of  the  Catholic  Emancipation  Bill  was  to  abol- 
ish the  Oath  of  Abjuration  and  the  Test  Act. 

All  England  on  this  subject  was  wildly  agitated.  When, 
returning  from  New  England  in  1828,  we  reached  England 
in  October,  I  was  six  years  old,  and  well  remember  seeing 
the  words  "No  Popery"  scrawled  in  chalk  upon  fences  and 
walls  along  our  route  from  Liverpool  to  London. 

In  those  days,  during  the  time  of  an  election,  all  Tories 
wore  blue  badges,  and  the  Whigs  yellow.  I  recollect  one 
Tory  in  Ipswich  who  would  not  suck  an  orange  or  eat 


6O      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY, 

the  yolk  of  an  egg  during  an  election.  Of  course  this 
wearing  of  colors  led  to  fights  and  riots  indescribable, 
especially  as  the  Blue  and  Yellow  candidates  had  each 
their  own  public- houses,  at  which  their  supporters  were 
supplied  with  beer.1 

The  Catholic  Relief  Bill  passed  in  1829,  under  the 
administration  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington.  That  year 
and  the  next  there  were  riots  all  over  England  in  oppo- 
sition to  the  introduction  of  threshing-machines.  I  have 
seen  barns  blazing  by  night  in  all  quarters  of  the  horizon. 
Farmers  were  warned  by  a  mysterious  individual,  "  Tom 
Swing,"  and  if  they  did  not  at  once  abandon  their  new 
machines  and  take  back  the  old  flails  for  threshing,  their 
barns  were  fired. 

Before  the  passage  of  the  Catholic  Relief  Bill,  however, 
the  King,  wishing  to  re-establish  his  popularity,  which  had 
been  so  much  impaired  by  the  Queen's  trial,  determined  to 
make  several  progresses  in  different  parts  of  his  dominions. 
He  had  never  in  his  life  been  out  of  England.  He  went 
to  Ireland,  where  his  reception  was  cordial,  but  he  was  two 
days  crossing  the  Irish  Channel  on  his  return  to  England. 
His  yacht,  which  was  attended  by  several  English  warships, 
encountered  a  stiff  gale,  and  for  some  hours  the  King  was, 
or  thought  himself,  in  great  danger.  He  visited  Hanover, 
landing  at  Calais  on  his  way  thither,  where  in  the  street 
among  the  crowd  he  caught  sight  of  his  discarded  favorite, 
Beau  Brummel.  He  does  not  seem  to  have  admired  his 
German  subjects,  who,  however,  did  their  best  to  convince 
him  that  they  were  delighted  to  see  their  sovereign,  after 
having  been  deprived  of  that  honor  for  more  than  sixty 
years.  In  the  summer  of  1822  it  was  decided  that  he 
should  visit  Scotland.  Poor  dear  Sir  Walter  Scott  made 
the  arrangements  for  his  reception  in  Edinburgh,  where, 
at  a  great  levee  held  at  Holyrood,  His  Majesty  appeared 
dressed  in  the  Highland  garb,  affording  food  for  laughter 
to  those  who  found  it  ludicrous  that  an  immensely  fat  King 

1  An  account  of  an  election  such  as  I  saw  in  Ipswich  in  1829  may  be 
found,  with  little  exaggeration,  in  Warren's  "  Ten  Thousand  a  Year." 


PRINCESS  CHARLOTTE.  6 1 

should  appear  as  a  Highlander  in  a  Lowland  city,  where 
three-quarters  of  a  century  before,  all  Highlanders  had  been 
considered  savages  and  cattle-thieves.  "  Surely,"  says 
Lockhart,  in  that  delightful  book  of  biography,  his  Life  of 
Scott,  "  no  Stuart  prince,  except  Prince  Charles  when  in 
rebellion  against  the  great-grandfather  of  George  IV.,  had 
ever  thought  of  presenting  himself  in  the  saloons  of  Holy- 
rood  in  Celtic  array  !  " 

The  King,  however,  professed  to  assume  this  incon- 
gruous costume  out  of  compliment  to  the  Scottish  nation. 
The  affair  had  at  least  one  merit :  it  gave  pleasure  in  his 
waning  days  to  the  dear  and  good  man,  Sir  Walter  Scott, 
whom  all  generations  of  English-speaking  men  and  women 
should  delight  to  honor.  He  had  the  entire  charge  of 
the  arrangements,  which  he  conducted,  as  far  as  he  could, 
with  mediaeval  pageantry. 

Here  is  his  letter  on  the  occasion  to  his  eldest  son  :  — 

MY  DEAREST  WALTER,  —  This  town  has  been  the  scene 
of  such  giddy  tumult  since  the  King's  coming,  and  for  a  fort- 
night before,  that  I  have  scarce  had  an  instant  to  myself. 
For  a  long  time  everything  was  thrown  on  my  hands,  and  even 
now,  looking  back  and  thinking  how  many  difficulties  I  had  to 
reconcile,  objections  to  answer,  prejudices  to  smooth  away,  and 
purses  to  open,  I  am  astonished  I  did  not  have  a  fever  in  the 
midst  of  it.  All,  however,  has  gone  off  most  happily,  and  the 
Edinburgh  population  have  behaved  themselves  like  so  many 
princes  ;  for  the  day  when  he  went  in  state  from  the  Abbey  to 
the  Castle  with  the  regalia  borne  before  him,  the  street  was 
lined  with  the  various  trades  and  professions,  arranged  under 
their  own  deacons  and  office-bearers,  with  white  wands  in  their 
hands,  and  with  their  banners,  and  so  forth.  As  they  were  all 
in  their  Sunday  clothes,  you  positively  saw  nothing  like  mob, 
and  their  behavior,  which  was  most  steady  and  respectful 
towards  the  King,  without  either  jostling  or  crowding,  had  a 
most  excellent  effect.  They  shouted  with  great  emphasis,  but 
without  any  running  or  roaring,  each  standing  as  still  in  his 
place  as  if  the  honor  of  Scotland  had  depended  on  his  be- 
havior. .  .  .  The  Celtic  Society,  "all  plaided  and  plumed  in 
their  tartan  array,"  mounted  guard  over  the  regalia  in  the 
Abbey  with  great  order  and  stateliness.  They  were  exceed- 


62      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

ingly  nobly  dressed  and  armed.  There  were  from  two  to  three 
hundred  Highlanders  besides,  brought  down  by  their  own  chiefs, 
and  armed  cap-a-pie.  They  were  all  put  under  my  immediate 
command  by  their  own  chiefs,  as  they  would  not  have  liked  to 
receive  orders  from  each  other.  .  .  .  To-morrow  or  next  day 
the  King  sets  off,  and  I  also  take  my  departure,  being  willing 
to  see  Canning  before  he  goes  off  for  India,  —  if,  indeed,  they 
are  insane  enough  to  part  with  a  man  of  his  power. 

Lockhart  in  his  Life  of  Scott  does  not  by  any  means 
share  his  father-in-law's  enthusiasm.  On  the  contrary,  he 
pokes  some  sly  fun  at  the  ceremonies  on  the  occasion. 
He  tells  how,  when  Sir  Walter  (an  old  acquaintance  of 
His  Majesty)  went  on  board  the  royal  yacht  on  its  arrival, 
the  King  called  for  a  bottle  of  Highland  whiskey,  and, 
having  drunk  Sir  Walter's  health  in  that  national  liquor, 
caused  another  glass  to  be  filled  for  him.  Sir  Walter,  after 
draining  it,  made  a  request  that  the  King  would  condescend 
to  bestow  upon  him  the  glass  out  of  which  His  Majesty  had 
just  drunk  his  health.  This  being  graciously  granted  him, 
the  precious  article  was  immediately  wrapped  up  and  de- 
posited in  the  pocket  of  Sir  Walter's  coat.  On  reaching 
home,  he  found  the  venerable  Mr.  Crabbe  awaiting  him; 
and  in  his  joy  at  seeing  his  brother- poet,  he  drew  up  a 
chair,  sat  eagerly  down  beside  Crabbe,  —  and  the  glass  in 
his  coat-tail  was  smashed  to  atoms  ! 

Lockhart  says  also,  "The  King  at  his  first  levee  di- 
verted many  and  delighted  Scott  by  appearing  in  the 
full  Highland  garb.  His  Majesty's  Celtic  attire  had  been 
carefully  watched  over  by  the  Laird  of  Garth,  who  was  not 
a  little  proud  of  his  achievement.  ...  In  truth  King 
George  did  look  a  most  stately  and  imposing  person  in 
that  beautiful  dress  ;  but  his  satisfaction  was  cruelly  dis- 
turbed when  he  caught  sight  of  Sir  William  Curtis,  the  fat 
and  eccentric  London  alderman,  dressed  in  the  same  Stuart 
tartans  and  all  the  rest  of  the  Highland  paraphernalia." 

As  to  the  central  figure  among  the  "plaided  and 
plumed,"  if  we  wish  to  see  how  unloved  and  unrespected 
he  was  in  his  own  home  at  Windsor  Castle, — a  failure  in 


PRINCESS  CHARLOTTE.  63 

every  relation   of  life,  —  we  may  take  this  passage  from 
Charles  Greville's  Memoirs  :  — 

"  The  Kin**  complains  that  he  is  tired  to  death  of  all  the 
people  about  him.  He  is  less  violent  than  he  was  about  the 
Catholic  Question,  —  tired  of  that  too,  and  does  not  wish  to 
hear  any  more  about  it.  He  leads  a  most  extraordinary  life ; 
never  gets  up  till  six  in  the  afternoon.  They  come  to  him  and 
open  the  window  curtains  about  six  or  seven  in  the  morning. 
He  breakfasts  in  bed,  and  whatever  business  he  can  be  brought 
to  transact  is  done  in  bed  too.  He  reads  every  newspaper 
straight  through;  dozes  three  or  four  hours;  gets  up  in  time 
for  dinner ;  and  goes  to  bed  between  ten  and  eleven.  He  sleeps 
very  ill,  and  rings  his  bell  forty  times  a  night.  If  he  wants  to 
know  the  hour,  though  a  watch  hangs  close  to  him,  he  will  have 
his  valet-de-chambre  down  rather  than  turn  his  head  to  look 
at  it.  The  same  thing  if  he  wants  a  glass  of  water." 

A  few  months  after  Charles  Greville  wrote  thus  in  his 
"Journal,"  the  King  died.  Ten  days  after  his  death 
Greville  again  records :  "  Nobody  thinks  anything  more 
of  the  late  King  than  if  he  had  been  dead  fifty  years,  unless 
it  be  to  abuse  him,  and  rake  up  his  vices  and  misdeeds." 

A  few  pages  must  suffice  for  the  Princess  Charlotte,  whose 
fate,  however,  made  so  deep  an  impression  on  the  nation 
that  for  more  than  a  generation  after,  one  class  of  the 
people  dated  events  before  or  after  "  the  death  of  Princess 
Charlotte."  1 

Princess  Charlotte  was  born,  poor  girl,  on  Jan.  7,  1 796. 
The  separation  of  her  parents  occurred  a  short  time  after, 
and  the  Princess  of  Wales  went  to  reside  principally 
at  Montague  House,  Blackheath.  There,  for  a  little  while, 
the  baby  was  suffered  to  remain  with  her ;  afterwards  they 
were  parted,  and  she  was  only  allowed  to  see  her  daughter 
once  a  week. 

1  When  in  our  nursery  we  would  ask  our  dear  old  English  nurse, 
"  How  long  have  you  had  this  bodkin,  or  this  ribbon  ? "  she 
would  answer :  "  Let  me  see :  I  think  I  had  it  two  winters  before 
Princess  Charlotte  died."  And  I  have  elsewhere  met  the  same  mode 
of  computation. 


64      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Hannah  More  speaks  of  Princess  Charlotte  as  being  in 
her  babyhood  "  exactly  like  the  child  of  a  private  gentle- 
man, —  wild  and  natural,  sensible,  lively,  and  civil.  Though 
only  six  years  old,  when  the  Bishop  of  London  one  day 
told  her  that  on  her  next  visit  to  the  sea-side  she  would  be 
in  his  diocese,  she  dropped  unbidden  on  her  knees,  and 
asked  his  blessing." 

After  a  time  the  Princess  was  removed  to  Carlton  House, 
her  father's  residence ;  but  weekly  she  used  to  be  driven 
over  to  Blackheath  to  see  her  mother.  "  On  these  occa- 
sions," says  an  eye-witness,  '-she  stood  at  the  carriage-door 
kissing  her  pretty  hand  to  those  who  bowed  to  her,  her 
beautiful  fair  hair  falling  on  her  shoulders.  One  day  we 
observed,  to  our  surprise,  that  she  wore  a  black  crop  wig, 
surmounted  by  a  turban  with  a  rose  in  it.  On  remarking 
this  to  a  lady  connected  with  the  court,  she  said,  '  Oh,  I 
can  explain  it.  The  Prince  of  Wales  the  other  day  asked 
Lady  Elgin  why  the  child's  hair  was  suffered  to  grow  long 
in  that  frightful  manner.  And  on  hearing  that  her  mother 
liked  it  long,  he  sent  for  scissors,  and,  without  another  word, 
cut  the  hair  off  himself  so  close  to  the  child's  head  that  it 
had  to  be  rubbed  with  spirits  to  prevent  her  taking  cold.'  " 

Princess  Charlotte  loved  her  mother,  "  who,"  says  the 
same  writer,  "  though  wayward  and  flighty  almost  beyond 
belief,  had  a  certain  gay  good-humor  very  attractive  to 
children ;  but  the  little  Princess  was  by  no  means  fond  of 
her  grandmother,  Queen  Charlotte,  whom  her  mother  had 
taught  her  to  consider  stern  and  stingy." 

It  must,  however,  be  said  in  defence  of  Queen  Charlotte 
that  after  her  death  it  was  found  out  that  her  six  extrava- 
gant younger  sons  had  been  a  continual  drain  on  her 
resources. 

One  day,  when  Princess  Charlotte  had  been  deliberately 
guilty  of  a  breach  of  court  etiquette  in  her  behavior  to 
the  Queen,  the  old  lady  sent  for  her,  and  addressed  her 
thus :  "  The  King's  days  can  be  but  few,  and  should  an 
untimely  end  unhappily  await  his  successor,  your  father, 
you  would  be  Queen  of  England.  In  that  case  I  should 


PRINCESS  CHARLOTTE.  65 

think  it  proper  to  pay  you  the  same  respect  that  you  now 
owe  to  me."  This  so  much  touched  the  Princess  that  she 
burst  into  tears. 

Her  character  was  compounded  of  self-will,  caprice,  and 
obstinacy,  tempered  by  kind-heartedness,  generosity,  a 
strong  love  of  truth,  candor,  and  rectitude.  It  depended  into 
what  hands  she  would  fall  in  matrimony,  which  elements 
would  prevail. 

She  was  fine-looking  rather  than  beautiful,  very  pale, 
with  a  lovely  neck  and  arms.  She  stuttered  a  little,  but 
her  voice  was  "  ever  soft,  gentle,  and  low,  —  an  excellent 
thing  in  woman." 

As  she  grew  older,  her  father  placed  her  at  Warwick 
House,  the  back  of  which  looked  upon  the  gardens  of  Carl- 
ton  House,  his  own  residence,  and  he  forbade  her  to  make 
any  more  visits  to  her  mother.  It  was  then  that  a  touching 
interview  took  place  between  mother  and  child  in  the  Park. 
Their  carriages  met  on  one  of  the  drives  near  the  artificial 
lake  called  the  Serpentine,  and  drew  up  side  by  side,  when 
mother  and  daughter  leaned  forward,  and  for  a  moment 
were  clasped  in  each  other's  arms. 

In  1814  the  Prince  of  Orange  presented  himself  in  Eng- 
land as  Princess  Charlotte's  suitor.  Her  father  wished  her 
to  marry  him,  and  at  first  she  consented.  But  on  discover- 
ing that  one  object  of  the  match  was  to  remove  her  from 
England,  she  broke  off  the  engagement.  Persuaded  that 
her  aversion  to  the  Prince  was  fostered  by  her  mother,  the 
Prince  Regent  is  said  to  have  broken  open  his  daughter's 
writing-desk  and  seized  her  letters.  He  resolved  also  to 
remove  her  to  Cranbourne  Lodge,  a  dull,  secluded  residence 
in  the  centre  of  Windsor  Forest. 

"Accordingly,  he  repaired  to  Warwick  House,  accompanied 
by  five  ladies  whom  he  had  chosen  to  replace  the  ladies  of  her 
household.  These  he  left  in  an  ante-chamber  while  he  had  an 
interview  with  the  Princess,  in  which  he  told  her  abruptly  and 
roughly  that  her  attendants  were  all  dismissed  ;  that  she  must 
pack  up  instantly  and  accompany  the  new  ladies  he  had  provided 
for  her  to  Cranbourne  Lodge.  Commanding  her  outraged  feel- 

5 


66      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

ings,  she  only  begged  she  might  have  five  minutes  given  her  to 
take  leave  of  her  attendants  and  prepare  for  the  journey.  On 
her  leaving  the  room,  her  father,  pleased  with  his  own  good 
management,  returned  to  Carlton  House  to  dress  for  dinner. 
No  sooner  had  he  left  the  house  than  the  Princess,  in  bonnet 
and  shawl,  stole  down  the  back  stairs  and  passed  out  alone  into 
the  street.  She  called  the  first  hackney-coach  she  met,  and, 
putting  a  guinea  into  the  astonished  coachman's  hand,  ordered 
him  to  drive  her  to  Connaught  House,  where  her  mother  was 
then  living.  The  Princess  of  Wales  proved  to  be  spending  the 
day  at  Blackheath.  Thither  Princess  Charlotte  at  once  sent  a 
messenger.  Her  mother  was  in  her  carriage  to  return  home 
when  this  messenger  reached  her.  She  showed  spirit  and  good 
judgment  on  the  occasion.  She  drove  at  once  to  the  House  of 
Commons  and  asked  to  see  Mr.  Wliitbread,  who  was  not  there, 
then  to  the  House  of  Lords  to  get  Lord  Grey,  who  was  also 
absent.  Then  she  secured  Mr.  Brougham,  and  also  Miss 
Mercer  Elphinstone,  one  of  Princess  Charlotte's  young  girl 
friends.  Soon  after  these  reached  Connaught  House  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  Lord  Eldon,  the  Lord  Chancellor,  and  the 
Duke  of  Sussex,  together  with  several  other  persons  sent  by  the 
Prince  Regent,  arrived,  each  in  a  hackney-coach,  no  one  having 
had  time  to  order  his  own  carriage  and  horses." 

The  Lord  Chancellor  was  very  violent  with  the  Princess, 
—  the  rest  persuasive.  There  was  no  help  for  her.  By  the 
law  of  England  she  was  absolutely  subject  to  the  King's  (or 
Regent's)  will  during  her  minority.  She  is  said  to  have  ex- 
acted a  promise  that  she  should  not  be  forced  to  marry  the 
Prince  of  Orange,  and  was  then  carried  back  to  Warwick 
House,  whence,  with  her  new  ladies,  she  was  removed  to 
what  was  almost  an  imprisonment  at  Cranbourne  Lodge. 

Her  mother,  either  to  carry  out  a  previously  formed  re- 
solve, or  because  her  presence  seemed  to  embarrass  her 
daughter's  position,  left  England  for  the  Continent  a  month 
later,  and  mother  and  daughter  never  met  again. 

Princess  Charlotte's  health  failed,  under  the  many  restric- 
tions forced  upon  her.  She  was  not  allowed  to  see  her 
friends,  and  it  was  only  occasionally  and  with  difficulty  that 
she  could  get  leave  to  write  to  them.  Here  are  one  or  two 
of  her  letters  at  that  period. 


PRINCESS  CHARLOTTE.  67 

She  had  asked  leave  to  see  a  friend  who  was  going  abroad, 
and  who  was  soon  to  be  married. 

"This  was  refused,  and  with  a  clause,  too,"  she  says,  "that 
no  visits  shall  be  allowed  until  after  my  return  from  Weymouth. 
This  has  made  me  quite  hopeless  and  spiritless.  At  Weymouth 
I  hope  to  remain  not  more  than  a  month.  Going  there  is  a 
devoir  for  my  health.  Certainly  I  stand  very  much  in  need  of 
being  recruited  in  health.  ...  If  you  will  write  to  me  as  often 
as  you  can,  I  shall  feel  it  very  kind  of  you,  and  I  shall  not  fail  in 
writing  ;  only  consider  that  //  you  do  not  always  get  my  letters 
it  is  not  my  own  fault,  and  that  I  have  written.  And  I  shall 
think  the  same  if  I  do  not  hear  from  you.  .  .  .  What  may  or 
may  not  happen  to  me,  God  only  can  tell.  For  those  who  are 
happy,  looking  forward  is  a  happy  reflection  ;  for  those  unhappy, 
a  sorrowful  one  of  uncertainty.  Should  1  have  any  commissions 
(to  you  I  cannot  call  them  commands),  I  will  give  them  to  you, 
but  I  know  of  none  I  can  give  you  but  that  of  not  forgetting  me, 
and  not  believing  all  you  may  hear  about  me." 

Again,  in  the  same  letter,  recurring  to  the  refusal  to  let 
her  see  her  friend,  she  repeats  :  — 

"  How  bitter  a  mortification  it  is,  heightened  by  bad  spirits 
and  presentiments  of  God  knows  what  !  There  are  pains  and 
pangs  that  come  sometimes  and  make  one  think  one's  heart  will 
quite  break,  —  is  it  not  so  ?  This  is  a  grave  letter,  I  fear  too 
grave  ;  I  have  tried  not  to  make  it  more  so.  I  wish  and  I  pray 
for  your  health  and  happiness  and  all  that  can  add  to  it,  and  that 
when  we  meet  it  may  be  under  happier  auspices  and  circum- 
stances. I  can  only  offer  you  my  best  wishes.  It  is  little.  .  .  . 
Will  you  accept  the  enclosed  trifle  ?  It  is  only  that,  but  it  is  all 
I  have  to  offer  of  my  own  ;  and  I  have  no  means  of  any  sort  to 
procure  what  might  be  more  worthy  of  your  acceptation." 

Her  health  improved  at  Weymouth,  and  some  months 
later  she  wrote  again  to  her  friend  :  — 

"  I  always  think  six  months  got  over  of  the  dreadful  life  I 
lead  six  months  gained,  but  when  the  time  comes  for  moving 
from  place  to  place  I  do  it  with  reluctance,  from  never  knowing 
my  lot,  or  what  may  next  befall  me.  Experance  et  Constance  is 
my  motto,  and  that  supports  me  through  it  all." 


68     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Again  :  — 

"It  makes  me  sad  to  think  of  the  time  past,  and  of  the  time 
to  come.  I  don't  know  what  is  most  painful  to  think  of,  —  the 
past,  or  the  future.  •  .  .  My  life  is  one  quite  of  uncertainty  from 
day  to  day,  hour  to  hour,  and  total  ignorance  of  what  my  fate 
will  be,  where  to  go,  and  how  things  will  be  arranged." 

This  letter  terminates  with  words  of  the  most  generous 
appreciation  of  the  stern  old  grandmother,  who  had  never 
been  very  kind  to  her,  but  whose  'conduct  in  a  matter  of 
family  morality  she  entirely  approved. 

This  last  letter  was  written  in  September,  1815,  ten  weeks 
after  the  battle  of  Waterloo.  Esperance  et  Constance  had 
been  her  motto,  and  the  kind  Father  in  Heaven  was  provid- 
ing happiness  for  the  desolate  girl.  All  unconsciously  to  her, 
the  moment  of  her  deliverance  was  at  hand. 

There  had  come  to  England  in  1814  in  the  train  of  the 
Allied  Sovereigns,  a  young  Austrian  lieutenant  of  dragoons, 
dressed  in  a  handsome  white  uniform.  He  was  poor,  and 
lodged  in  a  by-street,  over  a  little  greengrocer's  shop,  which 
my  father  often  pointed  out  to  me. 

This  was  Prince  Leopold  of  Saxe-Coburg.  Princess 
Charlotte  had  noticed  him  at  one  of  the  very  few  fetes  at 
Carlton  House  that  she  had  been  permitted  to  attend,  and 
had  then  expressed  the  opinion  that  he  was  so  handsome 
she  wondered  that  the  lady  to  whom  he  was  said  to  be 
attached  did  not  at  once  accept  him.  It  is  supposed  also 
that  he  may  have  been  favorably  recommended  to  her 
notice  by  the  Grand  Duchess  of  Oldenburg,  sister  of  the 
Emperor  Alexander.  At  any  rate,  early  in  January,  1816, 
Prince  Leopold  was  summoned  to  England,  and  encouraged 
to  propose  himself  as  suitor  to  the  Princess  Charlotte. 

Her  father  had  never  been  willing  to  consider  her  in  the 
light  of  the  possible  heiress  to  the  English  throne.  His 
hope  was  to  divorce  his  wife  and  to  become  the  father  of  a 
son.  Parliament,  however,  persisted  in  considering  Princess 
Charlotte  as  his  heir. 

Her  father  may  have  thought  she  had  been  sufficiently 
punished  for  her  escapade  in  escaping  from  Warwick  House ; 


PRINCESS  CHARLOTTE.  69 

he  may  have  been  sensible  that  his  harsh  treatment  of  her 
was  increasing  his  unpopularity,  and  the  desire  of  the  coun- 
try to  see  her  married  may  have  weighed  with  him  and  his 
ministers.  Princess  Charlotte  had  thought  Prince  Leopold 
handsome  in  1814,  and  as  soon  as  she  knew  more  of  him 
his  high  qualities  filled  her  with  admiration. 

The  courtship  went  on  smoothly  and  prosperously.  They 
were  married  on  the  2d  of  May,  1816. 

"  She  had  longed  for  the  sympathy  and  affection  denied  her 
in  her  miserable  girlhood.  Now  she  Found  both  in  the  fullest 
measure,  and  her  happiness  was  just  as  great  as  her  former  suf- 
fering had  been  extreme. 

"  Everybody  knows  that  her  marriage  was  perfectly  happy, 
but  it  is  only  by  recollecting  her  former  misery  that  we  can  ap- 
preciate what  her  happiness  was.  in  place  of  constant  petty 
coercion,  —  indulgence.  Instead  of  isolation,  loneliness,  and 
suspicion,  —  sympathy  and  confidence  in  their  fullest  measure. 
And  the  society  of  all  the  old  friends  she  loved,  as  well  as  of 
many  fresh  ones  whose  talents  or  goodness  could  recommend 
them  to  her.  And  her  happiness  did  not  spoil  her  any  more 
than  adversity  had  hardened  her.  The  few  letters  preserved 
after  her  marriage  breathe  the  same  spirit  of  humility,  unselfish- 
ness, gratitude  for  kindness,  and  generous  thought  for  others. 
.  .  .  Though  her  nature  and  that  of  Prince  Leopold  were  very 
different,  there  could  not  have  been  more  perfect  harmony  than 
that  which  existed  between  them.  She  was  impulsive,  quick- 
tempered, eager,  and  impetuous  ;  he  was  quiet,  courteous,  re- 
served, and  grave  :  but  those  who  lived  with  them,  especially  her 
old  friends,  could  not  help  being  touched  and  amused  by  the 
change  wrought  in  her  by  the  influence  of  this  temperament  so 
unlike  her  own.  All  her  little  roughnesses  quieted  down,  her 
vehement  expressions  of  likes  and  dislikes  were  restrained  by  a 
reproving  look  or  word.  Leopold  at  that  time  spoke  little  English, 
—  they  usually  talked  French  together;  and  when  her  tongue 
and  her  high  spirits  were  carrying  her  beyond  the  bounds  of 
dignity  and  prudence,  she  would  be  checked  by  his  '  Doucement, 
ma  chere,  doucement.'1  She  called  him  Douccment,  but  she  took 
his  advice,  acted  on  it,  and  indeed  thought  of  nothing  but  pleas- 
ing him  and  showing  her  gratitude  for  the  happiness  he  had 
brought  her.  He,  on  his  part,  felt  the  bright  influence  of  her 
sunny  disposition,  her  liveliness,  and  warmth  of  heart  on  his  own 
naturally  melancholy  and  somewhat  morbid  disposition." 


7<D      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

It  is  a  little  singular  that  Leopold  twice  supplanted  the 
Prince  of  Orange,  —  once  as  a  suitor,  once  as  a  sovereign ; 
Belgium  having  been  torn  from  Holland  fourteen  years 
after  his  marriage  with  the  heiress  to  the  throne  of  England. 

Claremont,  which  had  been  built  originally  for  Lord  Clive, 
«vas  purchased  by  Parliament  for  the  residence  of  the  young 
couple,  and  the  eighteen  months  they  spent  there  was  a  con- 
tinual honeymoon.  The  grounds  of  Claremont  House  are 
of  great  extent,  and  the  gardens  employed  twenty  gardeners. 

"  All  the  stories  that  .have  come  down  to  us  of  her  life  at 
Claremont  exhibit  her  unbounded  goodness  of  heart  and 
tender  charity,  colored  by  an  engaging  bonhomie  that  must 
have  been  irresistible.  Now  we  find  her  ordering  twelve  thou- 
sand yards  of  silk  for  the  furnishing  of  her  house  to  assist  the 
Spitalfields  weavers,  now*  aiding  the  '  suffering  Irish,'  now 
visiting  the  cottages  and  interesting  herself  in  the  domestic 
concerns  of  the  rustics  of  the  neighborhood.  She  delighted 
in  the  place,  and  busied  herself  with  the  gardens  and  the 
forming  of  the  library.  Happy  as  was  this  life,  it  was  to 
last  but  a  little  time  !  " 

In  October,  1817,  only  a  month  before  the  young  wife's 
death,  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence  went  down  to  Claremont  to 
take  her  portrait.  He  has  left  an  account  of  his  visit,  in 
which  he  says  :  — 

"The  Princess  is.  as  you  know,  wanting  in  elegance  of  de- 
portment, but  has  nothing  of  the  hoyden  or  of  that  boisterous 
hilarity  which  has  been  attributed  to  her.  Her  manner  is  ex- 
ceedingly frank  and  simple,  but  not  rudely  abrupt  or  coarse,  and 
I  have  in  this  little  residence  of  nine  days  witnessed  considerable 
evidence  of  an  honest,  just,  English  nature,  .  .  .  somewhat  like 
that  of  the  good  King,  her  grandfather.  If  she  does  nothing 
gracefully,  she  does  everything  kindly.  ...  It  gratifies  me  to 
see  that  she  both  loves  and  respects  Prince  Leopold,  whose 
conduct  and  character  indeed  deserve  those  feelings.  From  the 
report  of  the  gentlemen  of  his  household,  he  is  considerate,  be- 
nevolent, and  just,  and  of  very  amiable  manners.  My  own 
observation  leads  me  to  think  that  in  his  behavior  to  her  he  is 
affectionate  and  attentive,  rational  and  discreet.  .  .  .  Her  man- 
ner of  addressing  him  was  always  as  affectionate  as  it  was 
simple,  — '  my  love  ; '  and  his  to  her  was  '  Charlotte.'  " 


PR 'IN 'CESS   CHARLOTTE. 


PRINCESS  CHARLOTTE.  71 

The  portrait  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence  was  to  paint  was  in- 
tended to  be  her  present  to  Prince  Leopold  upon  his  birth- 
day. Alas  !  when  that  birthday  came  she  and  her  little 
babe  lay  in  one  coffin.  Surgical  mismanagement,  it  was 
thought,  brought  about  their  deaths,  and  the  surgeon  in 
attendance  killed  himself. 

The  picture  was  taken  down  to  Claremont  and  placed  in 
the  breakfast-room.  Strong  men  who  had  known  her  in  her 
brief  days  of  happiness,  when  they  saw  it  wept  aloud. 

The  young  widower  desired  to  see  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence 
before  he  returned  to  London,  and  this  is  Sir  Thomas's 
report  of  their  interview  :  — 

"  The  Prince  was  looking  exceedingly  pale,  but  received  me 
with  a  firm  effort  at  composure.  'Two  generations  gone  !'  he 
said,  '  gone  in  one  moment.  I  have  felt  for  myself,  but  I  have 
also  felt  for  the  Prince  Regent.  My  Charlotte  has  gone  from 
the  country  !  It  has  lost  her!  She  was  a  good  —  she  was  an 
admirable  woman.  None  could  know  my  Charlotte  as  I  did 
know  her.  It  was  my  study  —  it  was  my  duty  to  know  her 
character  ;  it  was  also  my  delight.  Yes,'  he  resumed,  '  she  had 
a  fine,  clear  understanding,  and  very  quick.  She  was  candid, 
she  was  open,  and  not  suspecting.  But  she  saw  characters  at 
a  glance  —  she  saw  them  so  true.  You  saw  her, — you  saw 
something  of  us  ;  you  saw  us  for  some  days,  you  saw  our 
year.  Oh,  what  happiness!  And  it  was  solid,  —  it  could  not 
change.  We  knew  each  other.  Except  when  I  went  out  to 
shoot,  we  were  always  together,  and  we  could  be  together,  —  we 
did  not  tire.'" 

Subsequently  he  said  :  — 

"  She  was  always  thinking  of  others,  not  of  herself.  No  one 
so  little  selfish  !  —  always  looking  out  for  the  comfort  of  others. 
In  pain,  when  even  good  people  will  be  selfish,  my  Charlotte 
was  not." 

Prince  Leopold  made  Claremont  his  home  for  many 
years.  In  1826  he  refused  the  throne  of  Greece,  which 
it  is  said  he  afterwards  regretted,  and  in  1831  he  accepted 
that  of  Belgium. 

For  twenty  years  the  room  in  which  Princess  Charlotte 
died  at  Claremont  was  kept  closed.  Prince  Leopold's 


72      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

sister,  the  Duchess  of  Kent,  and  his  niece,  the  Princess 
Victoria,  were  often  with  him.  At  Claremont  there  is  a 
picture  of  the  Duchess  of  Kent  with  her  baby  daughter 
playing  with  a  miniature  of  her  dead  father. 

When  Leopold  became  King  of  the  Belgians  it  was  made 
a  condition  that  he  should  marry  the  Princess  Louise  of 
Orleans,  the  eldest  daughter  of  Louis  Philippe,  who  thus 
became  aunt  to  Queen  Victoria,  and  her  warm  personal 
friend. 

Both  the  Queen  and  Prince  Albert  looked  upon  King 
Leopold  as  a  father;  their  youngest  son  was  named  for 
him,  and  the  Princess  Louise  was  called  after  his  Queen. 

Leopold  died  in  1865.  He  had  two  sons  and  one 
daughter  by  his  second  marriage.  His  eldest  son,  the 
present  King  of  the  Belgians,  has  no  son,  and  the  heir- 
presumptive  to  the  Belgian  throne  is  his  brother,  the  Earl 
of  Flanders.  The  daughter  was  named  Charlotte.  This 
name  was  Italianized  into  Carlotta  when  she  married  the 
Archduke  Maximilian  of  Austria,  who  met  his  death  at 
Queretaro,  as  the  Emperor  Maximilian  of  Mexico.  She 
is  the  "  poor  Carlotta  "  whose  sad  fate  touches  all  hearts, 
and  who  is  tenderly  cared  for  by  her  Belgian  relatives. 

Claremont  seems  to  be  a  home  of  sorrows.  King 
Leopold  placed  it  at  the  disposition  of  his  father-in-law, 
Louis  Philippe,  in  1848,  who  two  years  later  died  there. 
There  too  died  the  good  and  gracious  widow  of  his  son, 
Helene,  Duchess  of  Orleans.  The  widowed  Duchess  of 
Albany  and  her  children  live  there  now. 


CHAPTER  III. 

LORD    CASTLEREAGH. MR.  CANNING.  —  THE   DUKE   OF 

WELLINGTON. 

T  HAVE  said  that  the  summer  of  1822  is  the  date  of  a 
*•  great  change  in  the  governing  principle  of  the  Euro- 
pean world,  —  a  change  from  blind  conservatism  to  a  pas- 
sion for  progress,  —  and  that  that  change  was  the  immediate 
consequence  of  the  suicide  of  the  Marquis  of  Londonderry, 
better  known  in  history  as  Lord  Castlereagh. 

And  yet,  though  "  his  body  lies  mouldering  in  the  grave," 
the  work  that  he  accomplished  still  cries  aloud  to  be  un- 
done. He  it  was  who  was  the  leading  spirit  at  that  Con- 
gress of  Vienna  which  carved  Europe  into  portions  in  the 
interest  of  rulers,  small  and  great,  who  held  out  their  hands 
for  such  slices  of  territory  as  might  be  assigned  them. 
He  it  was  who,  in  conjunction  with  Lord  Cornwallis,  did 
away  with  the  old  Irish  Parliament,  and  effected  what  it 
is  somewhat  an  Irish  bull  to  call  the  "  Union."  He  put 
down  the  rebellion  in  1798.  He,  more  than  even  Wel- 
lington (who  was  raised  to  command  in  the  Peninsula 
by  his  direct  influence),  overthrew  the  great  Napoleon's 
imperial  throne. 

It  will  not,  therefore,  be  out  of  place  if  I  briefly  run  over 
some  few  particulars  in  the  life  of  a  man  whose  death 
closed  a  period  in  English  policy. 

His  name  was  Robert  Stewart.  The  name  by  which 
he  is  best  known,  — -  Lord  Castlereagh,  —  was  the  honorary 
title  given  to  the  eldest  son  of  the  Marquis  of  London- 
derry. These  Stewarts  were  not  of  the  clan  royal  of  Scot- 
land, though  they  came  from  that  country  to  Ireland  in 


74      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

the  days  of  James  I.  The  family  were  ultra-Protestant. 
In  the  war  between  William  of  Orange  and  James  II., 
one  of  them,  at  the  head  of  a  troop  of  horse  (raised  at  his 
own  expense),  was  active  in  the  celebrated  siege  of  Lon- 
donderry, so  graphically  described  by  Lord  Macaulay. 

Lord  Castlereagh's  father  was  made  first  Marquis  of 
Londonderry,  after  rapidly  ascending  the  lower  steps  of 
the  peerage.  He  married  an  English  lady  of  rank,  and 
their  first  son  was  born  in  1769,  —  a  year  made  memorable 
by  the  birth  of  many  great  men.  On  coming  of  age  Lord 
Castlereagh  wished  to  enter  into  public  life,  and  it  cost 
his  father  ^60,000  ($300,000),  and  made  him  a  poor  man 
for  the  rest  of  his  days,  to  get  him  a  seat  in  the  Irish  Par- 
liament, so  enormous  were  the  election  expenses  in  those 
days.  His  first  act  was  to  express  his  intention  of  promot- 
ing Parliamentary  reform;  but  '-'circumstances"  alter  the 
views  of  statesmen,  and  the  last  part  of  his  life  was  taken 
up  in  opposing  any  such  change. 

Up  to  1793  no  Roman  Catholic  in  Ireland  could  vote 
for  a  member  of  the  old  Irish  Parliament.  In  that  year 
Roman  Catholics  secured  the  franchise,  and  all  who  paid 
rent  of  forty  shillings  and  upwards  per  annum  ($10)  could 
vote,  though  only  for  a  Protestant  candidate.  This  law 
had  been  passed  in  the  early  days  of  the  war  with  France, 
as  a  measure  to  allay  discontent  among  the  people.  It  had 
quite  the  opposite  result.  It  put  the  whole  country  into  a 
ferment.  It  encouraged  bribery ;  it  split  large  farms  into 
small  holdings  ;  it  inflamed  men's  minds  against  their  land- 
lords ;  it  stimulated  the  rebellion  of  1 798  ;  and,  finally,  it 
led  to  the  extinguishment  of  that  Parliament  which  the 
Home  Rule  party  is  now  trying  to  restore. 

"  The  original  condition  of  the  Irish  peasantry,"  says  a 
writer  on  Ireland,  "  was  not  that  of  owners  of  the  soil.  A 
few  hereditary  chiefs  (or  kings,  as  they  called  themselves), 
having  the  power  of  life  and  death,  ruled  the  whole  lower 
population  as  absolutely  as  a  king  in  Central  Africa.  Eng- 
lish law  raised  the  peasantry  from  this  condition,  and  gave 
them  the  rights  of  Englishmen ;  but  no  law  on  earth  could 


LORD   CASTLEREAGH.  75 

give  them  equal  industry,  prudence,  or  perseverance.  The 
English  settlers  grew  rich,  the  Irish  peasants  continued 
savage  and  poor.  They  robbed,  murdered,  and  rebelled ; 
were  put  down  by  the  strong  hand,  and  after  every  out- 
break they  were  punished  by  finding  more  and  more  of 
the  soil  of  Ireland  pass  into  the  hands  of  those  who  sup- 
ported the  rule  of  the  English  in  that  country.  Not,  how- 
ever, that  these  '  lands  '  consisted  of  fertile  fields,  dotted 
with  smiling  villages.  They  were  mostly  vast  green  swamps, 
uncrossed  by  roads.  The  Celtic  Irish  never  cultivated 
any  arts,  never  carried  on  any  commerce,  never  devoted 
themselves  to  agriculture." 

To  put  the  case  very  briefly :  English  landlords  by 
degrees  took  the  place  of  native  Irish  chiefs,  and  hostility 
to  landlords  of  an  alien  religion  and  an  alien  race  had  for 
three  centuries  been  at  the  root  of  Irish  troubles. 

With  the  sea  all  round  their  island,  the  Irish  never 
were  (nor  are  they  now)  sailors,  adventurers,  or  even 
fishermen.  They  make  gallant  soldiers  whe.n  disciplined, 
and  work  admirably  for  wages  in  gangs,  when  some  supreme 
authority  is  set  over  them.  National  feeling  in  past  times 
(whatever  it  may  be  at  present)  was  directed  to  mali- 
ciously envying  the  prosperity  of  English  colonists,  and 
seeking  measures  to  ruin  them.  In  1641,  fifty  thousand 
Protestants  perished  in  that  horrible  Irish  massacre  (sixty- 
nine  years  after  the  St.  Bartholomew)  which  was  so  sternly 
and  so  cruelly  avenged  by  the  iron  hand  of  Cromwell. 
In  1641,  Ireland  contained  but  a  million  of  inhabitants. 
Under  English  rule  in  less  than  two  centuries  its  popu- 
lation rose  to  be  eight  millions.  It  is  now  computed  at 
less  than  five  millions,  owing  to  the  famine  of  1845-47  and 
the  enormous  emigration. 

The  effect  of  new  and  untried  political  rights  on  the 
Roman  Catholic  peasantry  of  Ireland  in  1793  was  such 
that,  combined  with  the  sympathy  of  the  Northern  and 
ultra-Protestant  part  of  the  country  for  the  principles  of 
the  French  Revolution,  the  whole  island  became  ripe  for 
rebellion,  which  broke  out  in  1 798.  It  was  the  result  of  a 


76      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

combination  between  Protestant  Dissenters  in  the  North, 
and  the  Roman  Catholic  peasantry  in  the  South :  the 
insurgents  called  themselves  the  United  Irishmen.  The 
Irish  Protestant  militia,  which  had  been  armed  to  protect 
the  island  from  French  invasion,  was  employed  to  put  down 
this  rebellion,  and  committed  all  sorts  of  outrages  and 
cruelties  upon  the  Catholics.  The  rebellion  cost  in  all 
about  thirty  thousand  lives,  and  many  millions  of  pounds 
sterling.  Its  leaders  were  Wolfe  Tone,  Lord  Edward 
Fitzgerald,  and  Thomas  Addis  Emmett. 

The  Irish  Parliament  was  wholly  unable  to  cope  with 
the  rebellion ;  but  Lord  Castlereagh,  then  head  of  the  Gov- 
ernment in  the  absence  of  the  Viceroy,  took  vigorous 
measures  of  repression.  The  rebellion  was  nipped  in  the 
bud ;  but,  had  a  projected  French  invasion  under  General 
Hoche  taken  place  in  1798,  instead  of  two  years  earlier,  the 
fate  of  England  and  of  Europe  might  have  been  to  be  de- 
plored. But  the  French  fleet,  like  the  Armada,  was  dis- 
persed by  a  storm.  The  conspirators  betrayed  each  other. 
Emmett  was  banished  to  America.  He  was  the  only  one 
of  the  leaders  who  seems  to  have  united  prudence  with 
courage.  Wolfe  Tone  escaped  to  France  and  took  service 
under  the  Directory,  returned  afterwards  to  Ireland  in  a 
French  uniform,  with  a  party  of  French  invaders  under 
General  Humbert,1  was  taken,  tried,  condemned  to  death, 
and  died  by  his  own  hand  in  prison.  Lord  Edward  Fitz- 
gerald (son  of  the  Duke  of  Leinster),  after  wandering 
about  Ireland  in  woman's  clothes,  was  betrayed  by  a  lady 
named  Reynolds.2  Lord  Edward  was  wounded  by  his 
captors,  and  died  of  his  wounds  in  prison.  His  wife  was 
Pamela,  —  the  adopted  child  of  Madame  de  Genlis,  brought 
up  with  the  Orleans  princess  and  princes. 

The  vigor  of  Lord  Cornwallis  and  the  foresight  of  Lord 

1  The  best  account  I  know  of  the  invasion  of  General  Humbert 
may  be  found  in  Charles  Lever's  admirable  novel,  "  Maurice  Tierney." 

2  She  retired  to  Paris  with  her  blood-money.     In  1840  we  met  her 
frequently  at  English  parties,  where,  at  an  advanced  age,  she  waltzed 
indefatigably  with  her  grandson. 


LORD   CASTLEREAGH. 


77 


Castlereagh  having  broken  up  the  rebellion  and  repulsed 
the  French  invaders,  they  proceeded  to  put  an  end  to  the 
Irish  Parliament.  To  turn  the  Irish  Catholics  over  to 
the  ferocity  of  Protestant  Orangemen,  who  composed  that 
Parliament,  seemed  to  more  moderate  English  statesmen 
an  act  of  inhumanity.  To  admit  Catholics  into  the  Irish 
Parliament,  though  Mr.  Pitt  approved  the  measure,  was 
thought  untimely  and  impracticable.  It  was  therefore 
resolved  to  place  Ireland  under  the  milder  rule  of  the 
Imperial  Parliament,  and  to  effect  the  Union. 

In  those  days,  during  the  English  struggle  with  France, 
a  strong  government  in  Ireland  was  indispensable  to  the 
safety  of  the  British  Empire.  With  a  Protestant  Irish 
Parliament  that  might  goad  the  people  to  despair,  or  with 
a  Catholic  Parliament  in  sympathy  with  the  headstrong 
disaffection  of  the  people,  and  ready  to  ally  Ireland  with 
France,  England  would  never  have  been  safe  from  the 
chance  of  foreign  invasion.  How  far  the  same  reasons 
apply  now  is  uncertain.  In  the  event  of  a  war,  such  a 
Parliament  as  Ireland  might  choose,  within  thirty  miles  of 
England,  might  well  be  dreaded. 

The  Union  of  England  and  Ireland  having  been  accom- 
plished by  a  vote  of  the  Irish  Parliament  (individual  mem- 
bers of  which,  it  is  said,  were  not  above  being  influenced  by 
the  promises  of  Lord  Castlereagh),  that  nobleman  became 
a  resident  of  London,  and  took  office  in  the  cabinet  of 
1802.  In  1805,  the  year  after  Mr.  Pitt's  return  to  power, 
he  was  made  Secretary  of  War. 

Mr.  Pitt  died  in  1806,  and  was  succeeded  by  Lord  Gren- 
ville,  a  moderate  Whig  who  made  Mr.  Fox  his  Foreign 
Secretary.  Fox  died  the  same  year  as  his  great  rival. 

In  1807,  a  Tory  ministry,  with  Lord  Castlereagh  again  as 
War  Minister,  and  Mr.  Canning  as  Secretary  for  Foreign 
Affairs,  came  into  power.  Two  years  later,  Castlereagh  and 
Canning  fought  their  celebrated  duel.  Lord  Castlereagh 
lost  a  coat-button,  and  Mr.  Canning  was  slightly  wounded. 
Both  gave  up  office  and  retired  into  private  life.  The  duel 
led  to  no  personal  feud,  though  their  views  differed  to  the 


78      ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

last  on  matters  of  public  policy.  Canning  remained  out 
of  office  until  he  was  sent  to  Lisbon  as  ambassador  extra- 
ordinary to  welcome  the  King  of  Portugal  on  his  return 
from  Brazil.  He  declined  to  form  part  of  Lord  Liverpool's 
cabinet  because  Lord  Castlereagh  was  leader  of  the  House 
of  Commons  ;  but  he  subsequently  accepted  office  as  the 
President  of  the  Board  of  Control.  This,  however,  he 
resigned,  as  he  wished  to  take  no  part  in  the  Queen's 
trial. 

Lord  Castlereagh  after  the  duel  in  1809  remained  for 
some  time  out  of  office.  On  the  murder  of  Mr.  Perceval,  in 
1812,  Lord  Liverpool  became  Prime  Minister,  and  offered 
him  Mr.  Canning's  place  in  the  cabinet  as  Foreign  Sec- 
retary. Under  his  administration  the  power  of  Napoleon  was 
broken.  He  was  himself  the  English  representative  at  the 
Congress  of  Vienna.  There  a  new  map  of  Europe  was 
made.  The  claims  of  the  four  Allied  Powers  (or  rather 
three,  for  England  made  small  demands  upon  the  Congress) 
had  to  be  satisfied,  and  at  the  same  time  what  is  called  the 
balance  of  power  had  to  be  preserved.  Therefore  Russia 
was  not  allowed  to  take  any  steps  to  gain  the  coveted 
outlet  of  Constantinople,  nor  to  acquire  sufficient  Polish 
territory  to  form  an  autonomous  tributary  kingdom.  The 
French  King  of  Sweden  paid  for  his  throne  by  relinquish- 
ing all  claim  to  the  ancient  Duchy  of  Finland,  which  five 
years  before  had  been  annexed  to  Russia.  Austria  got  all 
Northern  Italy,  whose  people  bitterly  hated  her  sway. 
Prussia  acquired  fresh  possessions  on  the  Rhine,  and  Hol- 
land received  Belgium.  Prussia  greatly  desired  to  annex 
Saxony ;  but  only  a  part  of  it  was  accorded  to  her.  Small 
portions  of  territory  were  carved  out  of  Germany  to  satisfy 
the  pretensions  of  various  petty  princes ;  and  in  the  end 
the  Great  Powers,  England,  Russia,  Austria,  France,  and 
Prussia,  bound  themselves  to  defend  each  other's  possessions 
should  any  one  of  them  attempt  at  any  future  time  to  break 
this  Treaty  of  Vienna. 

Before  all  this  was  fully  concluded,  Napoleon  returned 
from  Elba,  and  the  labors  of  the  Congress  nearly  went  to 


LORD   CASTLEREAGH. 


79 


the  winds.  After  Waterloo  the  Powers  were  even  stronger 
than  before,  and  worked  their  will  in  Europe  with  a  higher 
hand. 

Lord  Castlereagh,  who  by  this  time  had  no  tenderness 
for  what  it  is  the  fashion  to  call  "  peoples,"  but  only  con- 
sidered the  rights  of  sovereigns,  continued  to  guide  the 
foreign  affairs  of  England  until  his  death.  He  was  accused 
of  keeping  spies  in  his  service,  after  the  Continental  sys- 
tem. He  certainly  put  down  every  show  of  liberal  feeling 
everywhere. 

Canning  used  to  say  that  "  no  vigor  of  mind  or  body 
could  stand  the  wear  and  tear  of  a  minister's  life  over  ten 
years."  Lord  Castlereagh  had  stood  it  thirty  years,  rising 
at  five,  and  occupying  himself  with  state  business  fourteen 
or  fifteen  hours  a  day.  He  succumbed  at  last  to  mental 
exhaustion,  aggravated  by  depressing  medicines  that  he 
took  to  check  the  gout.  At  a  cabinet  council  he  was  ob- 
served to  seem  "  very  odd,"  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington 
wrote  to  him  that  evening  to  urge  him  to  see  his  physician. 
He  went  down  to  his  country  place,  whither  the  physician, 
by  advice  of  the  Duke,  followed  him.  This  gentleman 
early  the  next  morning  was  summoned  to  his  Lordship's 
chamber  by  a  maid.  He  found  the  Marquis  standing  near 
a  window  in  a  strange  posture,  and  exclaimed,  "My  dear 
Lord,  why  do  you  stand  thus  ?  "  The  reply  was,  "  Bankhead, 
let  me  fall  upon  your  arm.  It  is  all  over ;  "  and  he  fell  for- 
ward dead.  He  had  cut  his  own  throat. 

He  was  a  tall,  handsome  man,  with  the  appearance  and 
the  manners  of  one  born  to  a  high  station.  After  his  death 
the  affairs  of  the  Foreign  Office  were  put  by  Lord  Liver- 
pool into  the  hands  of  Mr.  Canning,  in  spite  of  the  distaste 
for  his  sen-ices  felt  and  professed  by  the  King. 

Canning  at  once  reversed  his  predecessor's  policy  of  blind 
conservatism,  and  from  that  time  the  new  era  of  progress 
set  in. 

George  Canning  was  born  in  London  in  1770,  and  died 
fifty-seven  years  after,  in  1827.  His  father  was  a  gentleman 
of  very  small  estate,  and  Canning  was  his  only  son.  The 


80      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

father,  who  died  when  his  child  was  in  early  boyhood,  had 
offended  his  family  by  twice  marrying  beneath  him.  Can- 
ning's mother  (his  second  wife)  was  an  Irish  lady  of  beauty 
and  accomplishments,  but  of  low  origin.  After  his  death 
she  went  on  the  stage  for  a  time  to  support  herself  and  her 
son.  She  subsequently  married  an  actor,  and  on  his  death 
remarried  with  a  linen-draper  in  a  country  town. 

Notwithstanding  the  somewhat  plebeian  character  of 
these  associations,  Canning  was  educated  by  an  uncle  as  a 
young  aristocrat.  He  went  to  Eton,  where  he  greatly  dis- 
tinguished himself,  not  only  in  school,  but  out  of  it,  by  start- 
ing an  Eton  periodical  called  the  "  Microcosm."  When  still 
very  young  he  went  to  Oxford,  where  his  attainments  won 
the  notice  of  Sheridan,  who  predicted  his  success  in  public 
life.  When,  in  1 793,  he  entered  Parliament,  it  was  as  the 
follower  of  Mr.  Pitt.  He  was  the  man  Pitt  most  earnestly 
loved,  and  whom  he  designated  as  his  successor.  When 
about  twenty-three  he  projected  the  "Anti-Jacobin,"  the 
object  of  which  was  "  to  ridicule  and  refute  the  theories 
of  religion,  government,  and  social  economy  propounded 
by  the  revolutionary  leaders  in  France,  and  their  friends 
and  admirers  in  England."  Its  publication  took  place  as  a 
serial,  and  lasted  about  nine  months.  Hookham  Frere  and 
Canning  were  its  chief  writers.  The  contributors  met  in  a 
small  room  at  their  printers'  office,  where  each  laid  his  man- 
uscripts open  on  the  table  for  the  correction  of  the  others. 
Mr.  Pitt  contributed  occasionally  prose  articles  on  finance, 
but  its  most  celebrated  piece  was  Canning's  "  Needy 
Knife-Grinder,"  a  supposed  conversation  between  the 
Knife-Grinder  and  a  Friend  of  Humanity. 

In  the  last  number  of  the  "  Anti-Jacobin "  were  some 
celebrated  lines  on  Candor,  ending, — 

"  Give  me  th'  avowed,  th'  erect,  the  manly  foe : 
Bold  I  can  meet  —  perhaps  return  the  blow  ; 
But  of  all  plagues,  good  Heaven,  thy  wrath  can  send, 
Save  —  save — O  save  me!  —  from  a  candid  friend." 

Canning  did  not  confine  his  poetical  powers  to  the  "  Anti- 
Jacobin."  His  squibs  on  his  political  opponents  were  very 


GEORGE    CANNING. 


MR.    CANNING.  8 1 

good  and  very  frequent.  Addington  was  by  him  laughed 
out  of  office,  and  the  parliamentary  career  of  Mr.  Whit- 
bread,  the  brewer,  will  be  best  remembered  in  connection 
with  the  famous  parody  of  his  speech  on  the  trial  of  Lord 
Melville  in  Westminster  Hall.1  Nay,  whilst  head  of  the 
Foreign  Office  some  of  his  most  important  despatches  were 
written  in  rhyme.  On  one  occasion,  when  a  treaty  of  com- 
merce was  being  discussed  between  England  and  Holland, 
the  English  ambassador  at  The  Hague  was  summoned  from 
a  state  dinner  to  make  out  a  despatch  which  had  just  been 
received  in  cipher  at  the  legation. 

"  In  matters  of  commerce  the  fault  of  the  Dutch 
Is  giving  too  little  and  asking  too  much  ; 
So,  in  order  outrageous  demands  to  prevent, 
We  '11  clap  on  Dutch  bottoms  a  twenty  per  cent." 

But  these  brilliant  jeux  d'esprit  were  a  hindrance  rather 
than  a  help  to  Canning's  political  career.  Even  Sydney 
Smith  jeered  at  him  as  "  a  clever  writer  of  ephemeral  news- 

1  I  'm  like  Archimedes  for  science  and  skill ; 

I  'm  like  a  young  Prince  going  straight  up  a  hill ; 
I  'm  like  (with  respect  to  the  fair,  be  it  said), 
I  'm  like  a  young  lady  just  bringing  to  bed. 
If  you  ask  why  the  first  of  July  I  remember 
More  than  April,  or  May,  or  June,  or  November, 
T  'was  on  that  day,  my  Lords,  with  truth  I  assure  ye, 
My  sainted  progenitor  set  up  his  brewery. 
On  that  day  in  the  morn  he  began  brewing  beer; 
On  that  day  he  commenced  his  connubial  career ; 
On  that  day  he  renewed  and  he  settled  his  bills  ; 
On  that  day  he  cleaned  out  all  the  cash  in  his  tills ; 
On  that  day,  too,  he  died,  having  finished  his  summing, 
And  the  angels  all  cried  "  Here  's  old  Whitbread  a-coming  1 " 
So  that  day  I  still  hail  with  a  smile  and  a  sigh, 
For  his  beer  with  an  e,  and  his  bier  with  an  *"; 
And  still  on  that  day,  in  the  hottest  of  weather, 
The  whole  Whitbread  family  dines  all  together. 
As  long  as  the  beams  of  this  house  shall  support 
The  roof  which  o'ershades  this  respectable  court, 
As  long  as  the  light  shall  pour  in  through  these  windows 
Where  Hastings  was  tried  for  oppressing  the  Hindoos, 
My  name  shall  shine  bright  as  my  ancestor's  shines, 
Mine  recorded  in  journals,  his  blazoned  on  signs. 
6 


82      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

paper  productions,  an  extraordinary  writer  of  small  poetry," 
and  not  a  large-minded  statesman ;  "  and  it  is  hardly  sur- 
prising that  the  political  representatives  of  the  great  houses 
loved  not  to  be  subordinate  to  the  lively  intellect  of  the  son 
of  an  actress." 

Canning's  bearing  in  society,  too,  was  not  calculated  to 
favor  his  political  advancement.  "  Pitt,  cold,  austere,  and 
proud,  disarmed  the  sense  of  rivalry ;  Canning,  on  the  con- 
trary, gay,  easy,  and  elegant,  the  very  life  of  society,  pro- 
voked animadversions.  The  aristocracy  of  those  times  was 
apt  to  believe  it  ought  to  have  a  monopoly  of  those  gifts, 
and  to  stare  at  the  display  of  them  in  others  as  a  species  of 
impertinence."  Canning  either  did  not  see  this,  or  con- 
temptuously ignored  it. 

He  had  always  supported  Catholic  Emancipation,  pro- 
vided the  Catholics  would  give  guarantees  for  good  behavior. 
He  had  always  advocated  the  emancipation  of  slaves  in  the 
West  Indies.  While  Foreign  Secretary,  in  1808,  he  directed 
the  British  policy  of  opposing  Napoleon  in  Spain.  "  If 
there  is  any  part  of  my  political  life,"  he  cried,  "in  which  I 
glory,  it  is  that  in  the  face  of  every  discouragement,  diffi- 
culty, and  prophecy  of  failure,  mine  was  the  hand  which 
committed  England  to  an  alliance  with  Spain." 

In  1820  Mr.  Canning  formed  part  of  Lord  Liverpool's 
cabinet  as  President  of  the  Board  of  Control.  He  declined, 
however,  to  take  part  in  the  proceedings  of  his  colleagues  at 
the  time  of  the  Queen's  trial,  and  tendered  his  resignation 
to  George  IV.,  frankly  stating  his  reasons  at  the  same  time. 
The  King  accepted  his  resignation  with  expressions  of  es- 
teem for  his  talents  and  his  honesty,  but  for  a  long  time 
afterwards  he  bore  him  a  deep-seated  personal  grudge. 

His  Majesty  acquiesced  with  alacrity  in  Mr.  Canning's 
appointment,  in  the  summer  of  1822,  to  the  Governor- 
Generalship  of  India,  hoping  thus  to  send  him  into  exile. 
Canning  was  on  the  eve  of  departing,  when  the  death  of 
Lord  Castlereagh  made  a  change  in  the  ministry,  and 
the  Duke  of  Wellington  proposed  Canning  to  His  Majesty 
as  Minister  for  Foreign  Affairs.  A  curious  conversation  is 
then  said  to  have  taken  place. 


MR.    CANNING.  83 

" '  Good  Heavens,  Arthur,'  said  the  King,  '  you  don't  mean  to 
propose  that  fellow  to  me  as  Secretary  for  Foreign  Affairs?  It 
is  impossible.  I  said  on  my  word  of  honor  as  a'gentleman  he 
should  never  be  one  of  my  ministers  again.  You  hear,  Arthur? 
—  on  my  word  of  honor  as  a  gentleman  !  I  am  sure  you  will 
agree  with  me.  I  can't  do  what  I  said  on  my  word  of  honor  I 
would  not  do.'  '  Pardon  me,  sir,  I  don't  agree  with  you  at  all. 
Your  Majesty  is  not  a  gentleman.'  The  King  started.  '  Your 
Majesty,  I  say,'  continued  the  imperturbable  soldier,  '  is  not  a 
gentleman,  but  the  sovereign  of  England,  with  duties  to  your 
people  far  above  any  to  yourself,  and  these  duties  make  it 
imperative  that  you  should  at  this  time  employ  the  abilities  of 
Mr.  Canning.'  '  Well ! '  replied  the  King,  drawing  a  long  breath, 
'if  I  must,  I  must.'  " 

A  few  weeks  after  this  appointment  some  one  asked  the 
King  how  he  liked  his  new  Foreign  Secretary ;  to  which  he 
replied,  "  Like  him,  —  that  word  is  too  weak.  I  love  him  !  " 

"  Absorbed  in  public  affairs  and  satisfied  with  his  own  select 
circle  of  admirers,  Mr.  Canning  cared  little  for  society  at  large," 
says  Sir  Henry  Bulwer,  "and  in  general  confined  his  powers  of 
pleasing  (which  were  great)  to  his  own  set.  But  he  set  his 
heart  on  gaining  George  IV.'s  good  will;  and  what  with  fascin- 
ating Madame  de  Lieven,  whose  opinion  as  to  the  manners  and 
capacity  of  any  man  in  the  world  of  fashion  was  so  completely 
law  that  even  George  IV.  was  led  by  her  (desirous  as  he  was 
before  all  things  to  pose  as  a  man  of  fashion),  and  what  with 
reviving  in  the  King  memories  of  the  brilliant  days  of  his 
youth,  when  the  wit  of  Sheridan  sparkled  at  his  table,  and  the 
eloquence  of  Fox  rang  in  his  ears,  he  succeeded  entirely  in 
overcoming  the  prejudices  of  the  King,  who  had  previously 
looked  upon  him  as  a  clever  literary  politician,  but  not  a 
statesman." 

Besides  this,  the  King  always  had  to  be  managed  by  his 
ministers,  as  we  have  seen  in  the  instance  of  the  Duke  of 
Wellington ;  and  Canning  was  skilful  in  such  management. 

In  pursuance  of  his  South  American  policy,  of  which  I 
am  about  to  speak,  Canning  found  it  desirable  to  send 
envoys  to  the  newly  acknowledged  little  republics.  While 
he  was  considering  how  the  King  might  be  induced  favor- 
ably to  consider  this  matter,  Lord  Ponsonby  returned  from 


84      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

his  mission  to  the  Ionian  Isles,  very  desirous  of  procuring 
promotion  as  a  diplomatist.  Some  years  before,  there  had 
been  an  early  love  affair  between  him  and  Lady  Conyng- 
ham,  the  reigning  favorite  of  George  IV.  at  this  period. 
Lady  Conyngham,  on  beholding  her  old  lover  unexpectedly 
at  a  party,  was  overcome  with  emotion,  and  fainted  away. 
At  this  the  King  grew  jealous,  and,  as  he  always  did  in  any 
love-trouble,  took  to  his  bed.  All  business  was  stopped. 
The  King  would  see  none  of  his  ministers.  At  length,  how- 
ever, Canning  succeeded  in  obtaining  an  audience.  George 
IV.  received  him,  lying  on  his  bed  in  a  darkened  room,  the 
light  being  barely  sufficient  to  read  a  paper.  "  What 's  the 
matter?"  he  asked  peevishly.  "I  am  very  ill,  Mr.  Can- 
ning." "  I  shall  not  occupy  Your  Majesty's  attention  more 
than  five  minutes.  It  is  very  desirable,  as  Your  Majesty 
knows,  to  send  envoys  without  delay  to  the  States  of  South 
America  that  are  about  to  be  recognized.  .  .  ."  The  King 
groaned,  and  moved  impatiently.  "  I  have  been  thinking, 
sir,  that  it  would  be  most  desirable  to  select  a  man  of  rank 
for  one  of  these  posts."  Another  groan.  "  And  I  thought 
of  proposing  Lord  Ponsonby  to  Your  Majesty  for  Buenos 
Ayres."  "Ponsonby?"  said  the  King,  rising  a  little  from 
his  reclining  position,  —  "a  capital  appointment !  A 
clever  fellow,  though  an  idle  one,  Mr.  Canning.  May  I 
ask  you  to  pull  back  that  curtain  a  little?  A  very  good 
appointment  indeed.  Is  there  anything  else,  Canning,  that 
you  would  wish  me  to  attend  to?  "  "  From  that  moment," 
says  the  private  and  authentic  chronicle  from  which  this 
anecdote  is  taken,  "  Canning's  favor  rose  more  and  more 
rapidly  at  court."  But  what  an  opinion  does  it  give  us 
of  the  Majesty  of  England,  who  had  to  be  managed  like  a 
spoilt  child  ! 

Canning,  however,  was  in  all  things  a  true  Englishman. 
On  his  return  to  the  Foreign  Office,  in  1822,  he  wrote  to 
Count  Nesselrode,  then  Russian  Minister  for  Foreign  Affairs, 
"  You  know  what  my  principles  are,  and  that  where  others 
have  for  a  long  time  written  '  Europe,'  I  must  be  allowed  to 
write  '  England.' " 


MR.   CANNING,  85 

He  took  an  early  opportunity  of  going  counter  to  the 
Holy  Alliance,  —  that  system  of  Continental  policy  by  which 
Russia,  France,  Prussia,  and  Austria  bound  themselves  td 
stamp  out  every  tendency  to  promote  liberty,  or  to  disturb 
the  established  order  of  things  in  Europe,  wherever  found. 
England  did  not  formally  join  this  alliance,  but  Lord  Castle- 
reagh  approved  of  it,  and  acted  in  harmony  with  its  spirit. 

Spain  was  the  first  country  that  needed  the  repressing  hand. 
Spanish  patriots,  under  General  Riego,  rose  against  the 
feebly  wicked  old  King  Ferdinand,  and  forced  him  to  grant 
them  a  constitution.  The  Holy  Alliance  interfered.  France 
was  deputed  to  put  down  Spanish  patriotism,  and  to  bring 
back  the  former  state  of  things  in  the  Peninsula.  An  army, 
under  the  Due  d'Angouleme,  was  marched  over  the  Pyren- 
nees,  and  despotic  power  was  restored. 

But  the  Spanish  colonies  in  Mexico  and  South  America 
caught  the  revolutionary  infection.  Canning  amazed  Europe 
by  recognizing  them  as  independent  Republics,  saying,  in  a 
celebrated  speech,  "  I  resolved  that  if  France  had  Spain,  it 
should  not  be  Spain  with  the  Indies.  I  looked  to  America 
to  correct  the  inequalities  of  Europe.  I  called  a  new  world 
into  existence  to  redress  the  inequalities  of  the  old." 

From  1822  to  the  early  months  of  1827  Mr.  Canning  was 
Secretary  for  Foreign  Affairs  under  the  premiership  of  Lord 
Liverpool ;  but  one  morning,  at  the  close  of  February,  Lord 
Liverpool  fell  on  the  floor  of  his  breakfast-room  in  a  fit, 
holding  in  his  hand  a  letter  which  told  him  of  the  serious 
illness  of  Mr.  Canning.  He  died  in  less  than  a  week,  and, 
after  considerable  opposition  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Peel  and 
the  Duke  of  Wellington,  Canning  was  made  Prime  Minister. 
He  died  in  less  than  six  months  afterwards,  having  never 
recovered  from  a  cold  caught  in  St.  George's  Chapel,  Wind- 
sor, at  the  funeral  of  the  Duke  of  York,  while  waiting  two 
hours  for  the  royal  mourners. 

His  last  act  was  signing  the  Treaty  of  London,  which 
secured  partial  independence  to  Greece. 

"As  a  statesman  he  was  liberal,  wise,  consistent,  and  inde- 
pendent. The  three  great  acts  of  his  foreign  policy  were  the 


86     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

recognition  of  the  South  American  States,  the  maintenance  of 
constitutional  government  in  Portugal,  and  the  treaty  on  behalf 
of  Greece." 

In  domestic  politics  he  uniformly  supported  Catholic 
Emancipation,  and  opposed  Parliamentary  Reform. 

"  His  eloquence  was  persuasive  and  impassioned,  his  reason- 
ing clear  and  to  the  point,  his  manner  was  extraordinarily 
graceful,  and  his  wit  brilliant  above  all.  He  had  married  a 
rich  wife,  but  he  died  poor.  He  is  buried  in  Westminster 
Abbey,  where  a  beautiful  statue  of  him  in  the  act  of  making  a 
speech  stands  facing  that  of  Mr.  Pitt,  England's  still  greater 
commoner." 

Canning  died  in  August,  1827,  and- was  succeeded  as 
Prime  Minister  by  the  Duke  of  Wellington. 

The  Duke  —  for  he  was  for  long  years  called  THE  DUKE, 
par  excellence  —  was  the  fourth  son  of  Lord  Mornington,  born 
in  Ireland,  1769,  —  the  same  year  as  Napoleon  and  Lord 
Castlereagh.  The  three  great  British  celebrities  of  whom 
this  chapter  treats  were  all  Irishmen  ;  for  though  the  Canning 
family  claimed  its  origin  from  a  famous  Mayor  of  Bristol,  it 
had  been  settled  at  Garvagh,  in  County  Derry,  since  the  days 
of  Queen  Elizabeth.  The  Duke  was  sent  to  school  at  Eton, 
and  afterwards  to  a  French  military  academy  at  Angers. 
He  went  very  early  into  the  army  as  an  ensign,  and  was  em- 
ployed in  various  services  which  offered  no  opportunity  to 
attain  distinction,  until,  when  he  was  twenty-eight  years  old, 
his  brother,  Lord  Wellesley,  who  had  made  himself  prominent 
in  England  as  a  statesman,  was  sent  out  to  India  as  Gover- 
nor-General. At  that  time  the  English  were  involved  in  a 
war  with  Hyder  Ali  and  his  son,  Tippoo  Sahib.  Lord  Welles- 
ley  brought  his  brother  into  notice  by  giving  him  employ- 
ments in  which  his  abilities  would  meet  the  public  eye.  He 
did  well  in  everything  he  undertook,  and  at  the  age  of  thirty- 
four  found  himself  a  major-general  and  a  victorious  com- 
mander at  the  important  battle  of  Assaye. 

On  his  return  to  England  he  was  for  some  time  without 
employment,  till,  by  the  influence  of  Lord  Castlereagh,  he 
was  sent  to  the  Peninsula.  The  Duke  of  York  had  wanted 


THE  DUKE   OF   WELLINGTON.  8/ 

that  command  for  himself,  and  thenceforward  he  became 
Wellington's  personal  enemy.  Indeed,  Wellington  was 
always  unpopular  with  the  princes  of  the  Royal  Family,  his 
greatness  overshadowing  theirs. 

He  was  thwarted  and  worried  while  in  command  in  Por- 
tugal, and  supplies  were  withheld  from  his  army  by  the 
Government ;  and  at  last,  at  the  very  moment  of  success,  he 
was  superseded  by  Sir  Hew  Dalrymple,  a  very  inferior  com- 
mander. Public  clamor,  however,  on  his  return  to  England 
was  so  great  that  he  was  sent  back  to  Portugal  with  rein- 
forcements, and  fought  his  closely  contested  campaigns 
against  Soult  and  Masse'na. 

He  was  at  the  Congress  of  Vienna  when  Napoleon  came 
back  from  Elba,  and  was  at  once  put  in  command  of  the 
allied  armies  that  were  collected  in  all  haste  to  oppose  the 
Man  of  Destiny.  Wellington  had  been  sent  to  the  Congress 
that  he  might  escape  assassination  in  Paris,  where  a  plot  had 
been  formed  to  put  him  out  of  the  way. 

My  father  sailed  from  London  for  America  in  June,  1815, 
in  the  first  regular  packet- ship  that  crossed  the  ocean  after 
the  conclusion  of  the  War  of  1812.  While  in  the  Downs 
they  got  a  newspaper  containing  the  Duke's  first  despatches 
from  the  field  of  Waterloo.  These  despatches  were  so  un- 
like the  vaunting  bulletins  which  the  public  was  accustomed 
to  receive  from  Napoleon  after  a  victory  that  the  passengers 
concluded  that  it  was  "  Boney,"  after  all,  who  had  won  the 
day,  and  that  the  Duke's  despatches  were  intended  to  make 
the  best  of  a  defeat.  In  consequence,  they  made  the  whole 
voyage,  of  nearly  fifty  days,  under  this  impression,  specu- 
lating among  themselves  as  to  what  would  probably  be 
the  fate  of  Europe,  and  the  next  step  of  the  imperial 
conqueror. 

Speaking  of  Waterloo,  I  may  perhaps  be  allowed  to  tell 
here  a  little  anecdote  of  those  times,  showing  what  report- 
ers were  to  the  great  financial  houses.  News  of  the  victory 
was  of  course  despatched  at  once  to  Louis  XVIII. ,  who  was 
at  Ghent,  and  was  sent  also  by  Captain  Percy,  an  especial 
messenger,  to  ministers  in  England.  The  Rothschilds  had 


88      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY, 

their  own  agent  on  the  watch,  and  he  thought  his  best  plan 
would  be  to  station  himself  at  Ghent,  and  watch  for  the 
news  that  might  be  sent  to  the  French  King.  He  therefore 
hired  a  room  opposite  the  house  in  which  the  French  royal 
family  were  quartered,  and  kept  a  sharp  eye  on  the  move- 
ments of  His  Majesty. 

On  the  eventful  evening  the  King  gave  a  dinner-party. 
In  the  midst  of  it  the  Rothschilds'  agent  saw  a  courier 
covered  with  dust  gallop  up  to  the  door.  Through  the 
open  windows,  all  a  blaze  of  light,  he  saw  the  King  sum- 
moned from  the  dinner-table,  saw  him  receive  a  paper, 
saw  him  read  it,  saw  him  fling  his  arms  about  the  courier 
and  kiss  him  on  both  cheeks,  then  saw  him  return  briskly 
to  his  guests  at  table.  That  was  enough.  The  Roths- 
childs' agent  had  a  carriage  and  a  boat  in  readiness.  He 
was  off.  He  had  fair  winds.  He  reached  London  some 
hours  in  advance  of  Captain  Percy.  The  Rothschilds 
received  him  rapturously,  and  made  instant  use  of  his 
information.  Then  they  deemed  it  their  duty  to  take 
him  to  the  ministers  in  Downing  Street.  These  gentle- 
men did  not  believe  his  story.  In  fact,  what  had  he  seen? 
"Have  you  told  us  all?"  said  one  of  the  ministers,  when 
he  had  several  times  repeated  what  he  had  to  say.  "  All, 
except  one  thing,"  said  the  reporter.  "  I  saw  the  King 
hug  the  courier  and  kiss  him  on  both  cheeks."  "  Why 
did  you  not  tell  us  that  before  ?  "  asked  one  of  the  noble- 
men present.  "I  did  not  like  to  mention  it.  It  seemed 
so  un-English,  so  un-kingly."  "That  confirms  his  report, 
however,"  said  the  other.  "I  know  Louis  XVIII.  If  he 
would  hug  and  kiss  a  dirty  courier,  the  news  he  brought 
must  have  been  favorable  and  great." 

By  midnight  Captain  Percy  had  arrived.  He  went  first 
to  the  Prime  Minister's  house,  then  to  that  of  the  Secretary 
of  War.  Not  finding  either  of  them  at  home,  he  followed 
the  secretary  to  a  ball,  where,  after  he  had  delivered  his 
despatches,  he  was  dragged,  dusty  and  travel-worn,  into  the 
ball-room,  to  tell  his  tidings ;  above  all,  what  he  knew  of 
the  lists  of  killed  and  wounded.  Five  minutes  after,  the 


THE  DUKE   OF   WELLINGTON.  89 

house  was  empty.  The  guests,  without  waiting  for  their 
carriages,  had  dispersed  to  tell  the  news. 

After  Waterloo  there  were  no  honors  that  nations  or 
sovereigns  could  confer  that  were  not  showered  on  the 
Duke  of  Wellington.  At  the  Congress  of  Verona  he  had 
a  guard  of  honor,  like  sovereign  princes.  He  was  made 
Duke  of  Wellington ;  Duke  of  Cuidad  Rodrigo ;  Grandee 
of  the  First  Class  in  Spain  ;  Duke  of  Vittoria  in  Portugal ; 
and  Prince  of  Waterloo  in  the  Netherlands  ;  Knight  of  the 
Garter;  Grand  Cross  of  the  Bath;  Field- Marshal  of  the 
Army ;  colonel  of  two  regiments  ;  constable  of  the  Tower ; 
Warden  of  the  Cinque  Ports ;  and  he  was  in  receipt  of 
$250,000  a  year.  He  was  also  Field- Marshal  in  the 
Portuguese,  Spanish,  Netherlandish,  Russian,  Austrian,  and 
Prussian  services.  Apsley  House  was  built  for  him.  The 
kings  of  Prussia  and  Saxony  sent  him  magnificent  porce- 
lain ;  the  City  of  London  gave  him  a  shield  of  massive 
silver,  three  feet  in  diameter,  with  representations  of  his 
victories,  in  relief;  and  the  ladies  of  England  presented  him 
a  colossal  bronze  statue  of  a  nude  Achilles,  which  they 
placed  before  his  windows  at  Apsley  House. 

Besides  this  he  was  made,  after  the  death  of  the  Duke  of 
York,  commander-in-chief  of  the  English  army,  was  treated 
by  Queen  Victoria  rather  as  an  uncle  than  a  subject,  and 
her  third  son,  Arthur  Patrick,  the  Duke  of  Connaught,  was 
named  for  him.  As  he  rode  daily  through  the  London 
streets  on  horseback,  all  hats  were  lifted  to  him  as  if  to 
royalty,  and  with  his  finger  to  his  hat  he  returned  their 
salutations.  "  I  saw  the  Duke  this  morning,"  seemed  to 
every  man  who  said  it  to  set  a  mark  upon  the  day. 

I  had  a  good  view  of  him  once,  when,  in  the  spring  of 
1848,  I  went  to  the  House  of  Lords  to  see  the  Queen 
prorogue  Parliament.  He  came  into  the  House  early, 
when  there  were  few  peers  there.  He  was  in  Field-Mar- 
shal's uniform,  with  all  his  orders  on ;  but  over  his  red 
coat  he  wore  a  light  gray  overcoat  like  those  familiar 
to  us  in  pictures  of  Napoleon.  I  was  surprised  to  see 
that  he  was  so  small  a  man.  He  could  not  have  been 
more  than  five  feet  six,  —  the  same  height  as  Napoleon. 


QO      ENGLAND   IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

The  Duke  of  Wellington  and  Sir  Robert  Peel  (then  Mr. 
Peel)  formed  part  of  Lord  Liverpool's  administration ;  but 
on  his  death  they  refused  to  serve  under  Mr.  Canning. 
They  knew  that  he  favored  Catholic  Emancipation,  and 
they  were  not  prepared  to  follow  him.  Catholic  Eman- 
cipation, Parliamentary  Reform,  and  questions  of  the 
currency  were  the  three  topics  that  agitated  England  at 
that  day. 

A  brief  ministry  under  Lord  Goodrich  succeeded  Mr. 
Canning's;  but  in  January,  1828,  the  Duke  of  Wellington 
was  gazetted  as  First  Lord  of  the  Treasury,  —  in  other  words, 
Prime  Minister,  —  and  the  more  liberal  Tories,  who  had 
belonged  to  the  ministries  of  Lord  Liverpool  and  Mr. 
Canning,  made  no  difficulty  in  joining  him.  His  cabinet 
contained,  among  other  statesmen,  Sir  Robert  Peel,  Mr. 
Goldbourn,  and  Mr.  Huskisson.  A  quarrel  took  place 
between  the  latter  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  which 
led  in  the  end  to  Mr.  Huskisson's  sad  death,  as  I  shall 
tell  hereafter. 

Many  people  in  England  felt  as  if  the  English  constitu- 
tion and  the  Protestant  religion  had  received  their  death- 
blow when,  unexpectedly,  the  Duke  of  Wellington  and  his 
colleague,  Peel,  declared  themselves  in  favor  of  Catholic 
Emancipation.  Mr.  Pitt  had  advocated  it  as  far  back  as 
1 800 ;  but  the  dread  of  bringing  another  attack  of  insanity 
on  George  III.,  who  considered  that  to  grant  civil  rights 
to  Catholics  was  a  violation  of  his  coronation  oath,  kept 
him  from  pressing  the  measure.  Mr.  Canning's  heart  was 
set  on  carrying  the  Catholic  Relief  Bill  through  Parliament, 
and  by  the  concession  of  a  just  claim  pacifying,  as  he 
hoped,  the  people  of  Ireland.  He  died  on  the  eve  of 
its  attainment ;  but  the  Duke  and  Peel,  to  the  disgust  and 
consternation  of  many  of  their  adherents,  took  up  the 
measure  and  carried  it  through.  The  excitement  through- 
out England  was  intense.  The  Duke  of  Cumberland  posed 
as  defender  of  the  Protestant  faith.  But  in  spite  of  the 
exertions  of  himself  and  of  his  party,  the  bill  was  carried 
through  Parliament,  and  received  the  royal  signature, 
George  IV.  saying,  as  he  put  his  name  to  it,  "  that  his 


DUKE    OF  WELLINGTON. 


THE  DUKE   OF  WELLINGTON.  91 

feelings  and  sentiments  with  respect  to  the  measure  were 
unaltered,  and  that  he  never  before  affixed  his  name  with  pain 
and  regret  to  any  Act  of  the  Legislature  "  (April  13,  1829). 

Catholic  Emancipation  having  been  passed,  the  next 
measure  to  agitate  the  United  Kingdom  was  the  Reform  of 
Parliament ;  but  this  must  form  the  subject  of  another  chap- 
ter. Meantime  let  me  tell  of  the  death  of  Mr.  Huskisson. 

Edward  Cartwright  (brother  of  Major  Cartwright,  a  man 
who  lived  all  his  life  under  the  stigma  of  being  an  advanced 
radical,  because,  in  1774,  he  advocated  in  some  very  cele- 
brated letters  that  the  American  colonies  should  have  local 
legislatures)  spent  the  last  thirty  years  of  his  life  experi- 
menting on  carriages  to  be  run  on  ordinary  roads  by  steam. 
He  died  in  1824,  without  bringing  his  invention  to  any 
practical  use ;  but  when  George  Stephenson  started  his 
project  of  carriages  propelled  by  steam  on  iron  rails,  Mr. 
Huskisson  warmly  advocated  the  experiment,  and  from  his 
place  in  Parliament  supported  the  bill  to  authorize  the  con- 
struction of  the  Liverpool  and  Manchester  Railroad.  It 
was  during  the  discussion  of  this  bill  that  Sir  Isaac  Coffin 
made  a  speech  denouncing  the  project  "  as  a  most  flagrant 
imposition.  He  would  not  consent,"  he  said,  — 

"  to  see  widows'  premises  and  their  strawberry-beds  invaded. 
Railroad  trains  would  take  many  hours  to  perform  the  journey 
between  Liverpool  and  Manchester,  and  in  the  event  of  the 
scheme's  success,  what,  he  would  like  to  ask,  was  to  be  done  for 
all  those  who  had  advanced  money  in  making  and  repairing  turn- 
pike roads  ?  What  with  those  who  might  still  wish  to  travel  in 
their  own  or  hired  carriages,  after  the  fashion  of  their  forefath- 
ers ?  What  was  to  become  of  coachmakers,  harness-makers, 
coachmasters,  and  coachmen,  inn-keepers,  horse-breeders,  and 
horse-dealers  ?  Was  the  House  aware  of  the  smoke  and  the  noise, 
the  hiss  and  the  whirl,  which  locomotive  engines,  passing  at  the 
rate  of  ten  or  twelve  miles  an  hour,  would  occasion  ?  Neither 
the  cattle  ploughing  in  the  fields,  nor  grazing  in  the  meadows, 
could  behold  them  without  dismay.  Iron  would  be  raised  in 
price  one  hundred  per  cent,  or  more  probably  be  exhausted  alto- 
gether. It  would  be  the  greatest  nuisance,  the  most  complete 
disturber  of  quiet  and  comfort,  in  all  parts  of  the  kingdom,  that 
the  ingenuity  of  man  could  invent." 


92      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

But  Mr.  Huskisson,  member  for  Liverpool,  pressed  the 
motion,  and  the  bill  was  carried  by  a  vote  of  about  two 
to  one. 

After  incredible  difficulties  of  construction,  the  Liverpool 
and  Manchester  Railway  was  ready  to  be  opened  September 
5,  1830.' 

"  Its  completion  was  regarded  as  a  great  national  event,  and 
the  ceremonies  for  the  opening  were  arranged  accordingly.  The 
Duke  of  Wellington,  then  Prime  Minister,  Sir  Robert  Peel, 
Secretary  of  State,  and  Mr.  Huskisson,  M.P.  for  Liverpool, 
were  foremost  among  the  number  of  distinguished  persons  pres- 
ent. Part  of  the  show  was  to  be  a  procession  of  the  eight  loco- 
motive engines,  —  the  Northumberland,  Phoenix,  North  Star, 
Rocket,  Dart,  Comet,  Arrow,  and  Meteor.  At  Parkside,  about 
seventeen  miles  from  Liverpool,  the  trains  stopped,  that  the  en- 
gines might  take  in  water.  The  Northumberland,  with  the  car- 
riage containing  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  was  drawn  up  on  the 
right  hand  track,  that  the  other  seven  engines  might  pass  in  review 
on  the  other  track  before  him.  Mr.  Huskisson  had  alighted  from 
his  carriage,  and  was  standing  on  the  track  along  which  the 
Rocket  was  rapidly  approaching.  At  this  moment  the  Duke  of 
Wellington,  between  whom  and  Mr.  Huskisson  a  coolness  had 
existed  since  their  disagreement  which  had  been  followed  by  Mr. 
Huskisson's  resignation  from  the  ministry,  made  a  sign  of  recog- 

1  A  week  earlier,  August  28,  1830,  the  first  trial  trip  with  steam 
took  place  on  the  Baltimore  &  Ohio  Railroad,  which  was  to  carry  out 
Washington's  favorite  idea  of  uniting  the  Atlantic  seaboard  with  the 
Ohio  River.  The  Baltimore  &  Ohio  Railroad  was  exceedingly  crooked  ; 
the  Liverpool  and  Manchester  Railway  was  nearly  straight.  The  firsc 
steam-engine  placed  on  it  had  been  constructed  under  the  direction  of 
Mr.  Peter  Cooper,  of  New  York.  It  dragged  one  car,  containing  twenty- 
three  passengers,  and  attained  the  wonderful  celerity  of  twelve  to  fif- 
teen miles  an  hour.  The  car  was  made  light,  and  was  entirely  open. 
It  much  resembled  the  high  carts  that  carry  empty  barrels.  The  trial 
trip,  as  we  can  well  imagine,  was  an  exceedingly  exciting  one.  The 
curves  were  passed  without  difficulty  at  fifteen  miles  an  hour.  A  man 
riding  a  swift  horse  undertook  to  race  the  engine  from  Baltimore  to 
where  the  road  terminated  at  Ellicott's  Mills,  fourteen  miles  from  the 
city.  In  the  height  of  the  race  the  band  slipped  off  the  fly-wheel  of 
the  engine,  and  the  horse  won !  The  directors  and  their  friends 
were,  however,  elated  at  their  success;  and  when  the  little  engine,  for 
a  few  moments,  made  eighteen  miles  an  hour,  one  of  them  exclaimed 
that  he  should  record  it  in  a  book,  to  be  transmitted  to  posterity  1 


THE  DUKE   OF   WELLINGTON.  93 

nition,  and  held  out  his  hand.  A  hurried  but  friendly  grasp  was 
given ;  but  before  it  was  loosened,  a  cry  arose  of  '  Get  in,  get 
in  ! '  Alarmed  and  confused,  Mr.  Huskisson  endeavored  to  get 
round  the  open  door  of  the  Duke's  carriage;  in  so  doing  he  was 
struck  down  by  the  Rocket,  and,  falling  with  his  leg  across  the 
track,  the  limb  was  instantly  crushed.  His  first  words  on  being 
raised  were,  '  I  have  met  my  death  ! '  He  was  carried  into  a 
house  near  by,  and  only  lived  a  few  hours." 

The  accident  threw  a  deep  gloom  over  the  day's  proceed- 
ings. The  Duke  and  Sir  Robert  Peel  were  anxious  to  dis- 
continue the  procession ;  but,  in  view  of  the  thousands  of 
people  waiting  to  see  the  train  come  in  at  Manchester,  it 
was  decided  to  continue  the  journey.  There  was,  however, 
no  further  festivity. 

Next  day  a  train  started  from  Liverpool  to  Manchester, 
carrying  forty  passengers,  and  did  the  distance  in  the  allotted 
time,  —  two  hours.  Since  that  time  there  has  been  no 
interruption  to  the  daily  trains. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THE    REFORM    BILL. LORD    ALTHORP. LORD    BROUGHAM. 

WILLIAM  COBBETT. 

IV  yT  EN  and  women  in  England  younger  than  myself  have 
**•*•  probably  no  realizing  conception  of  the  intense 
excitement  produced  throughout  the  country  from  1828  to 
1832  by  the  agitation  of  the  Reform  Bill,  —  that  bill  which, 
as  some  one  phrased  it,  seemed  to  the  populace  "  a  bill  for 
giving  everybody  everything ;  "  that  bill  upon  whose  fate  all 
hopes  or  fears  were  concentrated ;  that  bill  which,  though 
its  passage  quieted  the  country  for  a  time,  made  far  less 
difference  in  practical  politics  than  had  been  expected, 
though  it  was  an  enormous  stride  forward  in  the  march  of 
progress,  which  has  to  keep  abreast  of  the  spirit  of 
the  times. 

There  is  no  better  illustration  to  me,  as  I  think  over  those 
days  and  recall  the  agitation  of  England,  of  how  all  classes 
and  all  ages  caught  the  fever  of  politics,  than  to  remem- 
ber how  I  —  a  child  of  eight  in  1830  —  was  encouraged 
by  my  mother  to  produce  my  first  literary  composition ; 
viz.  two  numbers  of  what  we  called  "The  Nursery  Gazette." 
Well  I  remember  standing  by  my  mother's  side  and  dic- 
tating it !  Here  are  some  of  its  contents.  I  give  them  as 
a  specimen  of  the  feelings  of  the  day,  of  the  hourly  talk 
that  interested  and  excited  even  the  youngest  members  of 
a  quiet  household. 

"Nursery  Gazette,"  November  14,  1830  :  — 
POLITICS. —  We  are  happy  to  inform  our  readers  that  the 
prospects  of  the  country  are  a  little  brighter.  The  funds  have 
risen,  owing  to  the  report,  it  is  imagined,  that  the  Duke  of 
Wellington  was  going  to  resign.  This,  however,  has  not  yet 
taken  place.  Kent  is  a  little  more  quiet ;  but  the  fires,  we 


THE  REFORM  BILL.  95 

regret  to  say,  are  beginning  to  spread  into  Essex  and  Sussex. 
On  Tuesday  afternoon  two  respectably  dressed  men  in  a  ba- 
rouche stopped  a  boy  and  inquired  :  "  Who  is  your  master  ?  " 
To  which  he  replied,  "  Master  Sherwin,  sir."  "  Tell  him  to 
keep  a  good  look-out,"  said  they,  and  rode  on.  About  ten 
o'clock  at  night  Mr.  Sherwin's  barns  and  outhouses  were  set 
on  fire.  The  boy  had  told  his  master,  but  it  created  no  alarm, 
and  was  not  attended  to. 

The  "  Nursery  Gazette"  No.  2,  November  21,  1830  :  — 

POLITICS.  —  We  are  happy  to  inform  our  readers  that  the 
Duke  of  Wellington  has  really  resigned,  as  well  as  the  other 
ministers..  This  has  had  a  good  effect,  not  only  upon  the  coun- 
try, but  on  the  two  patients  mentioned  in  our  last,1  who  have 
almost  entirely  recovered  their  health  and  spirits.  The  fires 
in  Kent  still  continue  to  burn  with  unremitted  fury,  and  we 
are  sorry  to  add  they  are  now  fast  spreading  into  Suffolk.  For 
our  own  part,  we  do  not  blame  the  peasantry  for  using  some 
means  to  obtain  support ;  but  they  ought  not  to  use  violence,  for 
we  do  not  see  what  good  they  can  possibly  gain  by  it. 

We  regret  to  state  that  we  shall  not  be  able  to  publish 
another  number  next  week,  the  printer  having  refused  to 
perform  his  part  of  the  "  Nursery  Gazette." 

Which  meant  that  my  mother,  very  sensibly,  finding  that 
the  "  Nursery  Gazette  "  was  getting  talked  about  (my  father 
being  but  too  ready  to  spread  its  fame),  thought  that 
editorial  notoriety  at  eight  years  old  was  by  no  means 
good  for  her  little  girl.  Indeed,  a  female  taste  for  literary 
work  was  a  thing  in  those  days  by  no  means  to  be  encour- 
aged in  a  demoiselle  bien  elevee. 

Of  course  all  the  ideas  in  the  "Nursery  Gazette"  were 
the  result  of  the  general  excitement  upon  politics,  which 
penetrated  even  into  the  nursery. 

The  state  of  things  prevailing  in  England  at  the  date  of 
my  infant  paper  was  the  offspring  of  the  terror  created  by 
the  great  French  Revolution.  The  men  and  women  of  my 
childhood  had  grown  up  under  its  influence. 

1  My  father  and  his  chief  political  opponent,  Mr.  Roop,  paymaster 
of  the  garrison  at  Ipswich.  I  had  announced  in  No.  I  that  both  of  them 
were  suffering  from  a  political  fever. 


g6      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  Nine-tenths  of  the  English  people,"  says  Walter  Bagehot, 
"  were  above  all  things  determined  to  put  down  what  they 
called  French  principles;  and,  unhappily,  French  principles 
included  what  we  should  now  all  consider  obvious  reforms. 
They  would  not  even  allow  the  extreme  cruelties  of  the  penal 
code  to  be  mitigated ;  they  did  not  wish  justice  to  be  ques- 
tioned ;  they  would  not  let  the  mass  of  the  people  be  educated, 
or  at  least  only  so  far  that  it  came  to  nothing;  they  would  not 
alter  anything  that  came  down  from  their  ancestors,  for  in  their 
terror  they  did  not  know  but  there  might  be  some  charmed 
value  even  in  the  most  insignificant  thing  ;  and,  after  what  they 
had  seen  happen  in  France,  they  feared  that  if  they  changed  a 
single  iota,  all  would  collapse." 

Then,  too,  the  national  hatred  of  Napoleon  connected 
itself  with  this  hatred  of  revolutionary  principles.  Napo- 
leon was  really  the  man  who  set  himself  in  his  great  might 
to  stem  the  'tide  of  revolution,  to  reconstruct  society,  and 
bring  order  out  of  chaos ;  for  which  reason  it  is  now  the 
fashion  for  ultra-republicans  in  France  to  deny  him  and 
decry  him.  But  in  England,  long  after  I  began  to  think 
for  myself,  the  popular  idea  was,  that  he  had  been  a  raging 
Jacobin,  a  Robespierre  a  chevaL 

"A  war-time,  too,  is  naturally  a  hard  time,"  said  Mr. 
Bagehot ;  "  men's  minds  grow  familiarized  with  cruelty  by 
pain.  Suffering  seems  inevitable.  The  effort  is  made,  not 
to  alleviate  it,  but  to  bear  it." 

When  the  Great  War  was  closed,  innumerable  industries 
had  been  stopped.  The  price  of  land  in  England  went 
down  enormously ;  many  landed  proprietors  were  ruined. 
With  landlords  pinched,  laborers  suffered.  Trade  suffered 
from  the  uncertainties  of  commerce  and  of  credit.  The 
working-classes  were  in  a  chronic  state  of  suffering,  and 
the  savage  spirit  that  lies  latent  in  the  breasts  of  English- 
men showed  itself  at  its  worst.  Suffering,  of  course,  led  to 
complaint,  complaint  was  called  sedition.  I  remember 
well  the  panic  among  the  gentlefolks  of  Ipswich  and  its 
neighborhood  when  an  assembly  of  working-men  —  labor- 
ers and  others  —  met  on  Rustmere  Heath  to  have  a  con- 
ference with  the  gentry.  My  father  said  that  what  he  saw 


THE  REFORM  BILL.  97 

that  day  was  very  pitiful,  —  a  crowd  of  aimless,  dispirited, 
hungry  wretches,  bent  on  impressing  the  gentry  with  a 
sight  of  their  sufferings.  On  Rustmere  Heath  there  was 
no  attempt  at  violence  ;  but  in  many  places  it  was  otherwise. 
The  Habeas  Corpus  Act  was  suspended,  harsh  laws  were 
passed,  and  a  sterner  administration  of  justice  was  invoked 
to  put  all  complaint  (even  the  most  reasonable)  sternly 
down.  It  would  not  be  put  down ;  it  incessantly  smoul- 
dered and  incessantly  broke  out,  and  for  four  years  Eng- 
land was  filled  with  the  fear  of  violence,  first  by  the 
breakers  of  law,  and  then  by  the  defenders  of  it. 

As  I  write,  it  seems  to  me  that  my  childish  notion  con- 
tained the  gist  of  the  situation  :  that  it  was  not  surprising 
suffering  men  should  seek  some  means  of  improving  their 
condition,  but  that  lawless  violence  would  do  no  good. 

The  panacea  for  all  social  evils  was  supposed  to  lie  in  the 
Reform  Bill.  In  one  sense  it  did  lie  in  the  Reform  Bill, 
because  the  passage  of  that  measure  restored  confidence 
and  calmed  excitement ;  and  "  in  quietness  and  confidence 
shall  be  your  strength,"  is  as  true  of  nations  as  of  individual 
Christians.  But  the  Reform  Bill  of  1 83  2  politically  benefited 
only  that  class  which  corresponds  to  the  French  bourgeoisie. 
The  era  of  1830  was  the  especial  era  of  advancement  for 
such  men.  All  the  revolutions  of  that  year  upon  the  Con- 
tinent were  in  their  favor,  and  so  was  the  differently  con- 
ducted revolution  of  1832  in  England. 

The  Duke  of  Wellington  and  Sir  Robert  Peel,  though 
they  had  adopted,  and  successfully  carried,  the  bill  for 
Catholic  Emancipation,  in  opposition  to  the  larger  half  of 
their  own  (the  Tory)  party,  were  opposed,  as  Mr.  Canning 
had  been,  to  the  proposed  measures  of  Parliamentary  Re- 
form. George  IV.  died  in  the  summer  of  1830,  and  in 
August  of  the  same  year  Charles  X.  of  France  came  again 
as  an  exile  to  claim  English  hospitality. 

Let  me  briefly  endeavor  to  point  out  what  was  the  Reform 
Bill.  The  English  House  of  Commons  consists  of  over  six 
hundred  members.  These  are  elected  from  counties,  from 
the  Universities,  and  from  boroughs,  —  boroughs  meaning 

7 


98      ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

places  inhabited  by  burgesses ;  in  other  words,  incorporated 
towns.  In  the  days  of  the  Barons  and  in  the  Wars  of  the 
Roses,  Parliamentary  representation  was  ill-defined  and 
irregular.  The  House  of  Commons  "  struggled  up,"  as  it 
were,  till  it  became  a  mighty  power  in  the  state.  Like 
Topsy,  the  system  had  in  some  mysterious  manner  "growed." 
It  was  by  no  means  always  an  acceptable  position  to  be 
chosep  a  member  of  Parliament  for  a  borough.  "  In  those 
days,"  says  a  "  Quarterly  "  reviewer,  "  the  right  of  represen- 
tation was  regarded  as  an  oppressive  burden,  from  which  the 
smaller  boroughs  frequently  petitioned  to  be  set  free  ;  "  and, 
with  the  connivance  of  the  sheriff,  they  not  seldom  evaded 
the  exercise  of  their  privilege.  Furthermore,  down  to  the 
time  of  the  Reform  Bill  the  qualifications  for  voters  differed 
in  different  boroughs.  In  some,  there  was  universal  suf- 
rage ;  in  some,  only  the  mayor  and  bailiffs  voted ;  in  many, 
all  tax-payers  had  the  franchise ;  in  some,  only  the  free 
burgesses ;  in  some,  freeholders.  The  Reform  Bill  pro- 
posed to  make  the  qualification  for  voting  for  a  borough 
member  the  ownership  of  a  house  in  the  borough  of  the 
clear  yearly  value  of  not  less  than  ;£io,  provided  such 
person  should  have  paid  the  poor-rates  and  assessed  taxes, 
also  to  give  votes  to  those  who  paid  a  yearly  rent  of  ^10. 
This  necessarily  gave  an  immense  increase  of  power  to  petty 
tradesmen.  It  swamped  the  previous  importance  of  the 
cultivated  classes.  It  did  nothing,  or  less  than  nothing,  for 
the  laboring  population,  —  for  there  is  never  any  love  lost 
between  small  capitalists  and  the  poor ;  while  the  disfran- 
chisement  of  "  rotten  boroughs  " —  i.  e.,  boroughs  in  which 
there  were  few  or  no  voters  to  cast  their  votes — did  away 
with  the  practice  of  Government  to  watch  Oxford  and 
Cambridge  for  young  men  of  promise,  that  they  might  be 
brought  into  Parliament  as  supporters  of  the  ministry. 
Under  this  system  Macaulay  one  day  at  breakfast  opened 
a  letter  which,  to  his  surprise,  offered  him  a  seat  in  Parlia- 
ment. Gibbon  relates  that,  "  as  he  was  destroying  an  army 
of  barbarians,"  a  minister  of  the  Crown  called  and  offered 
him  a  seat  in  the  House  of  Commons.  It  was  the  aim  of 


THE  REFORM  BILL.  99 

statesmen  to  build  up  a  governing  class  in  those  days,  and 
the  House  of  Commons  always  contained  members  who 
from  education  or  sympathy  took  on  themselves  the  duty 
of  looking  after  especial  national  interests. 

In  the  days  of  Sir  Robert  Walpole  and  the  years  that 
succeeded  his  administration  the  possession  of  a  "  pocket 
borough  "  —  which  was  another  phrase  frequently  employed 
—  was  very  valuable  to  its  proprietor.  Even  in  the  novels 
of  the  day  we  see  that  to  offer  a  borough  to  the  Govern- 
ment was  a  common  and  not  discreditable  way  of  obtaining 
favors.  It  was  estimated  that  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
seven  lords  and  gentlemen  had  the  choosing  of  three  hun- 
dred and  fifty-five  members  of  Parliament.  The  most 
complete  instance  of  a  rotten  borough  must  have  been 
Lugershall,  the  member  for  which  rose  in  the  House  of 
Commons  and  said  :  "  I  am  the  proprietor  of  Lugershall ;  I 
am  the  member  for  Lugershall ;  I  am  the  constituency  of 
Lugershall ;  and  in  all  these  capacities  I  consent  to  the  dis- 
franchisement  of  Lugershall." 

That  retirement  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington  in  1830,  which 
as  an  infant  journalist  I  appear  to  have  approved,  made 
way  for  Lord  Grey,  who  was  pledged  to  bring  forward  a  Re- 
form Bill.  A  great  revolution  had  just  been  accomplished 
in  France  without  any  reign  of  terror,  and  the  advocates 
for  reform  were  greatly  encouraged.  It  had  been  said  to 
Lord  Grey  that  success  depended  upon  making  the  bill 
sweeping  enough  and  very  comprehensive.  Here  is  an  ac- 
count of  its  first  announcement  to  the  House  of  Commons, 
given  by  an  eye-witness,  John  Cam  Hobhouse  (afterwards 
Lord  Broughton) ,  Byron's  life-long  friend  :  — 

"At  last  came  the  great  day,  Tuesday,  March  r,  1831.  I 
went  to  the  House  at  twelve  o'clock,  and  found  all  the  benches 
crammed.  .  .  .  Lord  John  Russell  began  to  speak  at  six,  and 
then  never  shall  I  forget  the  astonishment  of  my  neighbors  as 
he  developed  his  plan  of  reform.  Indeed,  all  the  House  seemed 
perfectly  astounded;  and  when  he  read  the  long  list  of  the 
boroughs  to  be  wholly  or  partially  disfranchised,  there  was  a 
sort  of  mild  ironical  laughter,  mixed  with  expressions  of  delight 


IOO    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

from  the  late  Tory  ministers,  who  seemed  to  think  themselves 
sure  of  recovering  their  places  immediately.  Our  own  friends 
were  not  so  well  pleased.  One  of  them,  turning  to  me,  said, 
'  They  are  mad  !  —  they  are  mad  ! '  And  others  made  use  of 
similar  exclamations,  —  all  but  Sir  Robert  Peel.  He  looked 
serious  and  angry,  as  if  he  had  discovered  that  ministers  by  the 
boldness  of  their  measure  had  secured  the  support  of  the  coun- 
try. Lord  John  seemed  rather  to  play  with  the  fears  of  his 
audience,  and  after  detailing  some  clauses  which  seemed  to 
complete  the  scheme,  smiled  and  paused,  and  then  said,  '  More 
yet.'  .  .  .  When  Lord  John  sat  down,  we  who  were  advanced 
Liberals  cheered  loud  and  long,  although  there  was  scarcely  one 
of  us  who  believed  that  such  a  scheme  could  by  any  possibility 
become  the  law  of  the  land.  .  .  .  We  all  huddled  away,  not 
knowing  what  to  think  ;  the  and -reformers  chuckling  with 
delight  at  what  they  deemed  a  wholly  impracticable  project,  and 
the  friends  of  the  ministers  in  a  state  of  bewilderment." 


The  English  parliamentary  idea  differs  from  that  of  the 
United  States  in  several  particulars ;  in  the  latter  country 
Members  of  Congress  represent  their  own  districts,  and  take 
especial  charge  of  the  interests  of  their  own  constituents  ; 
in  England,  while  each  member  represents  a  county  or  a 
borough,  he  is  supposed  rather  to  fight  for  the  general  inter- 
ests of  the  country  than  for  local  interests.  Before  the  Reform 
Bill  passed,  in  1832,  each  county  sent  two  members  to  Parlia- 
ment, except  Yorkshire,  which  sent  four.  These  gentlemen 
were  officially  called  Knights  of  the  Shire.  The  Reform  Bill 
greatly  increased  the  county  representation  in  England,  from 
ninety-four  members  to  one  hundred  and  fifty-nine.  Fifty- 
six  boroughs,  which  had  sent  two  members  each  to  Parlia- 
ment, were  disfranchised.  Thirty,  which  had  sent  two 
members  to  Parliament,  were  reduced  to  one.  Eighteen 
large  towns,  which,  risen  to  importance  since  Queen  Eliza- 
beth's time,  and  had  never  returned  a  member,  were  now 
to  have  two  representatives  in  Parliament.  The  outly- 
ing parts  of  London,  with  a  population  over  a  million, 
were  divided  into  four  electoral  districts,  —  Lambeth, 
Marylebone,  Finsbury,  and  the  Tower  Hamlets,  —  each  of 
which  was  to  elect  two  members.  Ireland  received  five 


THE  REFORM  BILL.  IOI 

additional  members,  and  Scotland  five,  besides  which  the 
elective  franchise  in  Scotland  was  largely  extended,  being 
placed  on  the  same  footing  as  England. 

To  do  away  with  "  rotten  boroughs  "  was  a  principal  ob- 
ject of  the  Reform  Bill.  The  monstrous  character  of  the 
borough  of  Old  Sarum  has  been  frequently  mentioned ;  its 
name  was,  indeed,  a  sort  of  war-cry  among  reformers.  It 
had  once  been  a  Bishop's  See,  and  the  site  of  a  cathedral,— 
afterwards  removed  to  Salisbury,  —  and  had  returned  two 
members  to  Parliament  for  years  after  the  twenty-three  acres 
on  which  it  formerly  stood  had  not  a  house  or  an  inhabitant. 

In  England,  a  county  or  a  borough  may  choose  its  mem- 
ber of  Parliament  from  anywhere.1  Mr.  Gladstone,  who  is 
not  a  Scotchman,  sat  in  Parliament  for  many  years  as  mem- 
ber for  Midlothian.  No  member  of  Parliament  can  resign 
his  seat  unless  disqualified  to  retain  it  by  the  acceptance  of 
a  place  of  honor  and  profit  under  the  Crown,  or  by  some 
public  disgrace.  If  he  accepts  an  office  under  Government 
he  must,  if  he  wishes  to  retain  his  seat,  go  through  another 
election  to  ascertain  if  his  constituents  approve  of  his  join- 
ing the  administration.  If  a  member  desires  to  give  up 
his  seat,  he  therefore  accepts  the  Chiltern  Hundreds,  a 
small  office  under  Government,  with  a  salary  of  twenty 
shillings  ($5 )  a  year ;  and  then  he  has  to  quit  the  House 
of  Commons. 

The  members  of  the  House  all  wear  their  hats  except 
when  speaking,  —  a  token  that  they  acknowledge  no  superior 
under  their  own  roof.  The  Speaker  sits  in  gown  and  wig ; 
the  members  are  seated  upon  benches.  On  the  right  of 
the  Speaker  are  the  Government,  or  Treasury,  benches,  on 
which  sit  all  the  members  of  the  cabinet.  Opposite  to  them 
sit  the  leading  members  of  the  Opposition.  Behind  the 
Government  benches  sit  the  supporters  of  the  Government ; 
behind  the  Opposition  leaders,  their  friends.  Members 
speak  from  their  places,  and  without  their  hats.2 

1  It  was  proposed  once  to  return  my  father  as  member  for  Brighton, 
—  a  place  he  had  rarely,  if  ever,  been  in  in  his  life. 

2  When  I  saw  the  House  of  Commons  in  session  in  St.  Stephen's, 
in  1843,  ^e  member  speaking  (Sir  Charles  Napier)  had  his  hat  filled 


102   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

It  was  more  than  a  year  after  the  first  reading  of  the  Re- 
form Bill  before  the  measure  was  carried.  A  bill  has  to  be 
three  times  read  and  voted  on  in  England.  In  1831  the 
second  reading  passed  by  a  majority  of  one,  and  the  scene 
in  the  House  when,  on  March  22,  three  hundred  and  two 
members  voted  Aye,  and  three  hundred  and  one  No,  was 
breathlessly  exciting.  Before  the  third  reading  the  Govern- 
ment was  defeated  on  another  motion  by  a  small  majority, 
and  Lord  Grey  determined  to  dissolve  Parliament  and  appeal 
to  the  sense  of  the  country.  This  resolve  was  greatly  opposed 
by  William  IV.,  who  was  now  King.  He  had  been  a  Whig 
while  Duke  of  Clarence,  always  voting  in  the  House  of 
Lords  with  that  party ;  but  as  King  he  looked  upon  so  great 
a  change  in  popular  representation  as  revolutionary.  In  a 
paper  which  even  his  opponents  called  "  able  "  he  said 
(and  his  words  seem  almost  like  a  prophecy)  :  — 

"  The  King  conceives  that  the  most  strenuous  advocates  of 
Reform,  those  whose  object  it  may  be  to  introduce  a  preponder- 
ance of  popular  influence,  will  not  be  disposed  to  deny  that  the 
influence  of  the  House  of  Commons  has  increased  more  than 
that  of  the  Crown  or  the  House  of  Peers ;  and  the  question  is, 
Whether  greater  danger  is  not  to  be  apprehended  from  its 
encroachments  than  from  any  other  evil  which  may  be  the 
subject  of  speculation ;  and  whether  it  is  not  from  this  source 
that  the  mixed  form  of  government  in  this  country  has  to  dread 
annihilation  ?  " 

There  was  a  strong  court  party  opposed  to  the  passage  of 
the  bill,  to  Lord  Grey,  and  to  his  ministry.  The  excitement 
through  the  country  (and  I  well  remember  it)  was  intense ; 
there  was  mob  violence  all  over  England,  and  in  London 
and  at  Ascot  personal  insults  were  offered,  not  only  to  the 
King,  but  to  Queen  Adelaide,  who  was  popularly  supposed 
to  use  all  her  influence  to  persuade  the  King  to  obstruct 
the  bill. 

with  oranges.  Ladies  had  then  to  occupy  a  little  space  wide  as  a 
pew,  and,  sitting  on  a  seat  as  high  and  narrow  as  a  mantelpiece,  look 
through  the  ventilators.  It  is  against  the  law  for  strangers,  even 
reporters,  to  be  present,  and  therefore,  by  a  fiction,  members  are 
supposed  not  to  see  them. 


KING   Wfl.UAM  IV. 


THE   REFORM  BILL.  1 03 

The  new  Parliament  assembled  June  14,  1831.  In  Sep- 
tember the  bill  passed  its  third  reading  in  the  House,  and 
was  sent  up  to  the  Lords.  They  rejected  it  by  a  vote  of 
one  hundred  and  ninety-nine  to  one  hundred  and  fifty-eight. 
Lord  Grey  and  his  ministry  resigned.  The  Duke  of  Wel- 
lington and  his  friends  were  called  to  take  their  place ;  but 
the  Duke  could  not  form  a  cabinet.  Lord  Grey  resumed 
office.  Again  a  Reform  Bill,  slightly  altered,  passed  the 
House  of  Commons,  twenty-three  new  Whig  Peers  were 
created,  —  the  first  time  such  a  step  had  been  resorted 
to  by  any  ministry,  —  and,  to  help  the  passage  of  the  bill, 
about  a  hundred  Tory  Lords,  unwilling  to  vote  for  it, 
absented  themselves  from  the  House  of  Peers.  The  bill 
then  passed  both  Houses,  and  received  the  King's  reluctant 
signature  on  June  7,  1832.  During  several  months  the 
vacillations  of  King  William  IV.  had  caused  much  trouble. 

He  was  a  thoroughly  honest,  kind-hearted  man,  and  a 
good  man  of  business,  conscientiously  endeavoring  to  under- 
stand every  paper  that  he  signed.  But  his  eccentricity, 
especially  under  excitement,  seems  almost  to  have  amounted 
to  insanity,  and  in  the  early  months  of  his  reign  London 
society  made  merry  over  accounts  of  his  strange  behavior. 

He  affected  blunt  manners.  He  used  naval  slang,  though 
he  had  never  been  a  favorite  with  the  navy.  He  made  the 
most  extraordinary  speeches  in  public ;  in  private  he  would 
electrify  his  company  by  exclaiming,  "  I  am  tired.  I  wish 
you  a  good  night.  I  am  going  to  bed.  Come  along,  my 
Queen."  "  Altogether,"  says  Charles  Greville,  who,  how- 
ever, took  delight  in  reporting  the  poor  monarch's  eccen- 
tricities, "  he  seems  a  kind-hearted,  well-meaning,  not 
stupid,  burlesque,  bustling  old  fellow,  and  if  he  does  n't  go 
mad  may  make  a  very  decent  king." 

He  particularly  hated  France,  and  used  to  alarm  his 
ministers  by  the  speeches  he  made  about  her  on  public 
occasions.  His  bete  noire,  however,  was  Russia,  and  he 
dreaded  lest  she  should  invade  his  kingdoms.  In  view 
of  such  an  invasion  he  was  anxious  to  resuscitate  the  old 
militia.  Every  now  and  then  he  would  have  a  spurt  of 


IO4    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

irritable  self-assertion.  In  the  last  months  of  his  life  he 
was  particularly  put  out  with  the  Duchess  of  Kent,  and 
treated  her  on  one  occasion,  before  her  daughter  and  his 
guests,  in  a  manner  wholly  unbecoming  a  king  and  a 
gentleman. 

In  1867  —  that  is,  thirty-five  years  after  the  passage  of 
the  first  Reform  Bill  —  further  Parliamentary  reforms  were 
introduced  in  England.  The  ^10  qualification  was  re- 
duced to  forty  shillings,  so  that  any  man  who  has  a  family 
can  vote  for  the  member  for  his  borough.  This  approaches 
very  near  to  universal  suffrage.  It  has  swamped  the  £10 
bourgeoisie.  The  year  1830,  and  those  that  followed,  were 
the  favored  period  everywhere  for  the  bourgeois ;  the  day 
of  the  proletaire,  or  the  man  who  labors  with  his  own 
hands,  was  postponed  to  our  own  times.  All  civilized 
Europe  and  America  have  got  to  deal  with  that  problem 
now.  It  has  been  storing  up  for  many  years  for  us  to 
solve  it.  God  grant  we  may  meet  it  as  successfully  as  the 
generation  of  my  youth  did  that  which  was  presented  in 
1832! 

But  before  1  close  this  part  of  my  subject  let  me  repeat 
what  I  think  it  is  important  to  remember,  that  we  are  now 
treating  of  the  second  phase  of  politics  into  which  England 
had  entered  in  the  nineteenth  century.  The  first  was 
influenced  by  fear  and  rage  against  France  and  all  things 
French  and  revolutionary;  the  second  began  with  the 
death  of  Lord  Castlereagh,  and  was  the  era  of  the  infant 
growth  of  liberal  ideas.  The  statesmen  of  this  second 
period  were  largely  occupied  in  correcting  the  mistakes 
of  their  predecessors,  and  bringing  England  to  a  point  she 
probably  would  have  reached  a  quarter  of  a  century  before, 
without  convulsions,  had  not  the  French  Revolution  held 
her  back  from  progress. 

When  Lord  John  Russell  made  his  celebrated  speech 
introducing  the  Reform  Bill  to  the  House  of  Commons 
he  said  :  — 

"  Suppose  a  stranger  from  some  distant  country  should 
arrive  in  England  to  examine  our  institutions.  He  had  been 


THE  REFORM  BILL.  1 05 

informed  that  our  country  was  singular  from  the  eminence  she 
had  attained  in  wealth,  science,  and  civilization.  If  in  addi- 
tion to  this  he  learned  that  this  land  so  great,  so  learned,  so 
renowned,  once  in  six  years  chose  its  representatives  to  sit  in 
its  great  council  and  legislate  on  all  its  concerns,  with  what 
eagerness  would  he  inquire  by  what  process  so  important  an 
election  as  that  of  this  body  was  effected.  What,  then,  would 
be  his  surprise  if  he  were  taken  by  his  guide  to  one  of  the 
places  of  election, — to  a  green  mound,1  —  and  told  that  this 
green  mound  returned  two  members  to  Parliament,  or  to  a 
stone  wall  with  niches  in  it,  or  to  a  green  park,  and  told  that 
they  return  as  many  ?  But  greater  would  be  his  surprise  if  he 
were  carried  to  the  North  of  England,  where  he  would  see  large 
flourishing  towns  full  of  commerce  and  activity,  containing 
magazines  of  trade  and  manufactures,  and  was  told  that  these 
places  had  no  representatives  in  the  Assembly  which  was  said 
to  represent  the  people  !  " 

I  have  said  very  little  of  the  agitation  that  for  more  than 
a  year  spread  over  England  while  the  passage  of  the  Re- 
form Bill  was  debated  in  Parliament.  During  the  interval 
between  the  dissolution  of  Parliament  in  March,  1831,  and 
the  final  acceptance  of  the  bill,  even  the  mqst  quiet  parts 
of  England  were  in  a  ferment,  and  the  great  towns  were 
wrought  up  to  a  state  of  alarming  excitement.  One  of 
these  towns  was  Bristol;  an  account  of  the  riots  which 
occurred  there  may  be  a  sufficient  picture  of  the  state 
of  feeling  in  the  rest.2 

Bristol,  until  the  rise  of  Liverpool,  was  the  second  com- 
mercial city  in  England.  Liverpool  was  built  up  by  the 
cotton  trade ;  Bristol  by  colonial  commerce  and  the  slave 
trade.  In  the  centre  of  the  city  stood  both  the  cathedral 
and  the  Bishop's  palace,  on  College  Green,  and  the  mayor's 
official  residence  in  Queen's  Square.  Queen's  Square  was 
an  open  space  with  grass  and  trees.  An  equestrian  statue 
of  William  III.  stood  in  the  middle. 

1  Old  Sarum. 

2  Miss  Yonge  has  told  the  story  of  the  Bristol  riots  in  one  of  her 
volumes  called  "Chantry  Manor;"  and  she  also  gives  from  her  re- 
membrance an  excellent  picture  of  the  state  of  feeling  in  the  country 
at  that  time. 


IO6    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Bristol  had  been  much  excited  by  news  of  the  French 
Revolution  in  July,  and  its  working  population  was  very 
generally  affiliated  with  one  of  the  political  societies  then 
promoted  by  Cobbett,  and  all  were  ardent  in  the  cause 
of  reform. 

Of  course,  while  the  passage  of  the  Reform  Bill  was  in 
agitation,  everything  bitter  against  the  existing  system  was 
said  both  inside  and  outside  of  the  House  of  Commons. 
All  opposers  of  the  bill  were  loaded  with  opprobrium,  — 
dignitaries  of  the  Church,  and  more  especially  the  Peers. 
When  the  Lords  rejected  the  bill  passed  by  the  Commons 
in  September,  1831,  the  dread  of  riots  throughout  the 
country  was  very  great,  the  funds  fell,  and  the  public 
agitation  became  intense.  The  Recorder  of  Bristol  —  that 
is,  its  chief  judicial  officer  —  was  Sir  Charles  Wetherell,  who 
had  bitterly  opposed  the  Reform  Bill  on  its  first  introduc- 
tion in  the  House  of  Commons.  He  was  a  narrow-minded 
politician  and  very  unpopular.  He  was  expected  to  hold 
an  assize  in  Bristol  at  the  very  time  the  ferment  was  at  its 
height ;  and  so  great  was  the  apprehension  of  riot  on  the 
occasion  that  the  magistrates  asked  and  received  a  military 
force  to  protect  him  on  his  entrance  into  the  city.  This 
force  consisted  of  ninety-three  enlisted  men,  of  whom  half 
were  dragoons,  and  half  hussars. 

With  considerable  difficulty,  on  October  29,  the  Recorder 
was  got  safely  into  the  city.  There  was  one  moment  of 
great  danger,  however,  when  he  was  transferred  from  his 
own  coach  to  that  of  the  Mayor.  He  reached  the  court- 
house, however,  opened  court,  and  adjourned  it  for  two 
days.  Then  began  the  difficulty  of  getting  him  back 
in  safety  to  the  Mayor's  residence.  Law  and  order 
triumphed,  however,  for  a  time ;  but  at  night  an  attack 
was  made  upon  the  Mayor's  residence,  —  the  Mansion 
House,  —  which  was  nearly  demolished.  The  Riot  Act  was 
read  and  the  soldiers  sent  for.  By  the  laws  of  England,  a 
party  of  military  may  not  fire  on  a  mob  till  the  Riot  Act 
has  been  read  aloud  by  a  magistrate  by  way  of  warning. 
The  colonel  in  command  of  the  troops,  named  Brereton, 


THE  REFORM  BILL. 


lO/ 


lost  his  head.  He  said,  good-humoredly,  that  he  had  no 
doubt  he  could  make  the  rioters  walk  off,  and,  drawing  up 
his  troops  as  spectators  of  the  disorder,  he  refused  to  act  in 
any  other  way. 

The  hussars  were  very  impatient  under  this  inaction,  and 
their  officers  made  a  demonstration,  on  their  own  respon- 
sibility, which  checked  the  riot  for  a  time.  On  Tuesday 
the  rioters  poured  into  the  Mansion  House  grounds  and 
Queen's  Square ;  by  mid-day  the  Bishop's  palace  had  been 
taken  and  sacked,  the  jail-doors  opened,  and  the  prisoners 
dispersed.  The  mob  had  complete  possession  of  the  city. 
Still  Colonel  Brereton  refused  to  act,  and  even  ordered  the 
hussars  to  withdraw  into  the  country,  because  when  their 
captain  was  attacked  they  had  fired  on  the  mob.  The 
only  thing  that  checked  plunder  and  destructiveness  was 
general  drunkenness.  The  populace  broke  into  the  Bishop's 
and  Mayor's  wine-cellars,  and  propitiated  the  soldiers,  who 
stood  idle  spectators  of  these  outrages,  by  offering  them 
liquor.  The  only  orders  Colonel  Brereton  could  be  brought 
to  give  to  his  soldiers  were,  "  Use  no  violence.  Go  to  the 
spot  where  the  jail  is  being  stormed,  but  do  nothing."  So 
the  Bishop's  servants  were  driven  out  of  the  Bishop's  palace, 
and  the  building  was  consumed. 

The  Colonel  himself  on  Tuesday  night  went  to  bed  and 
to  sleep.  All  night  the  riot  went  on.  The  mob',  increased 
by  sympathizers  from  the  country,  began  to  plunder  and 
demolish  private  houses ;  when  suddenly  at  dawn  a  troop 
of  yeomanry  marched  in,  and,  after  the  riots  had  lasted 
three  days  and  nights,  cowed  Colonel  Brereton,  encouraged 
the  civil  power  to  appoint  special  constables,  and,  charging 
on  the  rioters,  cut  down  about  a  dozen.  The  uprising  was 
thus  quelled,  and  the  city  restored  to  the  care  of  its  police. 
The  total  amount  of  damage  done  was  estimated  at  about 
^65,000  ($320,000).  The  money  to  repay  claims  was  bor- 
rowed by  the  city  of  Bristol  from  the  Government,  and  repaid 
by  an  assessment  yearly  on  the  poor-rates.  Colonel  Brereton 
shot  himself. 

This  burning  of  Bristol  had  a  great  effect  in  France, 


108    ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

where  riots  in  Lyons  took  place  about  the  same  time,  in 
which  the  rallying  cry  was  "  Bristol !  "  Other  riots  took 
place  in  other  towns  in  England,  but  none  equalled  in  dura- 
tion or  destructiveness  the  riot  at  Bristol. 

There  were  three  men  very  prominent  in  the  passage 
of  the  Reform  Bill  besides  Lord  Grey,  the  Whig  leader, 
a  man  of  great  experience,  self-control,  amenity,  and  wis- 
dom. The  three  I  mean,  and  of  whom  I  should  like  to 
speak  in  this  connection,  are  Lord  Althorp,  Lord  Brou- 
gham, and  William  Cobbett.  In  each  of  their  lives  there 
are  picturesque  and  interesting  elements,  and  I  think  it 
may  be  well  to  give  of  each  a  brief  biography. 

The  most  prominent  of  those  personages  who  under  Lord 
Grey's  leadership  promoted  the  passage  of  the  Reform  Bill 
was  probably  Lord  Althorp.  Indeed,  it  has  been  commonly 
said,  "  It  was  Althorp  who  secured  the  bill ;  his  fine  temper 
did  it." 

In  the  House  of  Commons  there  is  always  a  man  who  is 
iccognized  as  leader  in  the  House.  He  is  the  man  to  whom 
the  party  of  the  Government  looks  in  all  emergencies,  —  the 
officer,  in  short,  who  drills  and  commands  subordinates. 
For  years  Sir  Robert  Peel  was  leader  of  his  party  in  the 
House;  Lord  John  Russell  and  Lord  Palmerston  were 
Whig  leaders. 

Lord  Althorp  was  the  only  son  of  Earl  Spencer ;  Althorp 
was  his  title  by  courtesy.  Until  his  father's  death  he  was 
only  a  commoner,  and  entitled,  if  elected,  to  sit  in  the 
House  of  Commons.  Lord  Palmerston  had  only  an  Irish 
title,  so  that  he  too  was  eligible  for  a  seat  in  the  Lower 
House.  Mr.  Disraeli  refused  the  title  of  Earl  of  Beacons- 
field  for  many  years,  not  wishing  to  sever  his  connection 
with  the  House  of  Commons. 

One  would  suppose  that  so  responsible  an  office  as  that 
of  "  leading  the  House  "  might  demand  a  man  of  especial 
talent  and  quickness ;  but  probably  no  leader  was  ever  so 
faithfully  followed,  so  trusted,  so  beloved,  as  Lord  Althorp, 
who  was  a  slow-witted  man,  with  little  or  no  education,  but 
so  sterlingly  good  and  sensible  that  all  men  put  their  trust  in 


LORD  ALTHORP. 

him.  "  His  mind,"  says  a  biographer,  "was  like  a  reserve 
fund,  not  invested  in  showy  securities,  but  sure  to  be  come 
at  when  wanted,  and  always  of  stable  value.  .  .  .  Every- 
thing with  him  was  solid  and  ordinary.  Men  seem  to  have 
trusted  him  as  they  trust  a  faithful  animal,  entirely  believing 
he  would  not  deceive  if  he  could,  and  that  he  could  not  if 
he  would." 

Lord  and  Lady  Spencer,  the  father  and  mother  of  Lord 
Althorp,  were  frivolous  people,  and  until  he  went  to  school 
at  Eton  he  lived  almost  entirely  in  the  stables,  getting  all 
the  early  instruction  he  ever  did  get  from  a  Swiss  footman. 
In  the  stables  he  learned  to  love  horses,  dogs,  and  field- 
sports.  All  his  life  he  was  a  "  mighty  hunter,"  yet  no  man 
ever  had  a  more  tender  love  of  animals.  With  culture  he 
would  probably  have  developed  into  a  distinguished  natural- 
ist. A  knowledge  of  animal  life  and  a  taste  for  statistics 
were  the  two  prominent  characteristics  of  his  mind.  He 
went  through  school  like  any  other  dull,  ordinary,  stout- 
hearted English  school-boy.  At  college  a  few  words  of 
interest  from  his  mother  spurred  him  up  to  make  some 
exertions  in  mathematics.  On  leaving  college  he  went 
abroad  ;  declined  to  learn  French,  shunned  society,  took 
no  interest  in  sight-seeing,  and  was  glad  to  get  home  to  his 
sports  and  his  hounds.  He  went  into  Parliament  in  1804 
for  a  family  borough,  and  had  an  office  in  the  Treasury,  to 
which  it  was  with  difficulty  he  could  be  brought  to  pay  any 
attention.  When  his  attendance  in  town  was  absolutely 
necessary,  he  used  to  have  horses  posted  along  the  road 
from  London  to  Althorp,  and  would  ride  hard  all  night  to 
get  home. 

"  Being  a  somewhat  uncouth  person,  and  addicted  to 
dogs  and  horses,  —  a  '  man's  man,'  as  Thackeray  used  to 
call  it,  —  he  probably  did  not  go  much  into  ladies'  society, 
and  was  not  very  agreeable  when  he  was  there."  It  is 
difficult  to  imagine  how  he  might  ever  have  succeeded  in 
getting  married,  if  he  had  not  met  in  the  hunting-field  a 
Miss  Acklom,  a  species  of  Di  Vernon,  who  made  all  the 
advances,  and  succeeded  in  capturing  him.  A  lady  who 


IIO    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

acts  thus  towards  a  young  nobleman  is  not  commonly  what 
we  call  "a  very  nice  person;"  but  Lady  Althorp  secured 
her  husband's  whole  heart.  When  she  died,  which  she  did 
in  a  few  years,  he  went  into  complete  retirement  for  months, 
occupying  himself  almost  solely  in  reading  the  Bible.  He 
gave  up  hunting,  because,  he  said,  he  should  find  too  much 
pleasure  in  it  for  a  man  in  such  affliction. 

But  during  his  wife's  life  he  had  begun  to  take  some  in- 
terest in  politics,  espousing  warmly  the  cause  of  the  lowly 
and  oppressed.  He  now  threw  himself  into  their  cause 
with  enthusiasm. 

"  So  far  from  running  away  to  hunt,  as  in  old  tfmes,  he  was 
so  constant  in  his  attendance  on  Parliament  that  tradition  says 
hardly  any  one,  except  the  clerks  at  the  table,  was  more  con- 
stantly to  be  seen  there.  He  opposed  all  the  acts  by  which  the 
Tory  Government  of  Lord  Castlereagh  tried  to  put  down  dis- 
satisfaction instead  of  curing  it,  and  his  manly  energy  soon 
made  him  a  sort  of  power  in  Parliament.  He  was  always  there, 
always  saying  what  was  clear,  strong,  and  manly,  —  things  that 
even  his  opponents  understood,  —  in  a  rugged  English  way  which 
changed  feelings,  if  it  did  not  change  votes.  He  was  a  man 
whom  every  one  in  the  House  respected,  and  therefore  he 
spoke  to  prepossessed  listeners.  No  doubt,  too,  the  tinge 
which  grief  had  given  to  his  character  added  to  his  influence. 
He  took  no  share  in  the  pleasures  of  other  men.  Though  a 
nobleman  of  the  highest  place,  still  young  (he  was  only  thirty- 
six  when  Lady  Althorp  died),  he  stood  aloof  from  society, 
which  courted  him,  and  lived  for  public  business  only  ;  and 
therefore  he  had  great  weight  in  it,  for  the  English  very  much 
value  obviously  conscientious  service,  and  the  sobered  fox- 
hunter  was  a  somewhat  interesting  character." 

So  invaluable  was  he  as  leader  in  the  House  of  Commons 
that  when,  in  1834,  his  father  died  and  he  had  to  take  his 
seat  in  the  House  of  Lords  as  Earl  Spencer,  the  loss  of 
his  services  in  the  Lower  House  broke  up  Lord  Grey's 
ministry.  King  William  refused  to  give  his  countenance 
to  a  W7hig  ministry  that  did  not  contain  Lord  Althorp, 
and  called  the  Duke  of  Wellington  and  Sir  Robert  Peel 
to  his  counsels.  They,  however,  found  it  impossible  to 


LORD  A L THORP.  Ill 

retain  office,  and  were  forced  to  give  place  to  a  new  ministry 
of  the  Whigs  under  the  premiership  of  Lord  Melbourne. 
Nothing,  however,  would  ever  induce  Lord  Althorp  (now 
Earl  Spencer)  to  enter  into  public  life  again. 

"  He  said  that  retirement  from  office  was  to  him  the  cessa- 
tion of  acute  pain,  and  never  afterwards  would  he  touch  it, 
though  he  lived  for  many  years.  .  .  .  He  retired  into  the 
country  and  occupied  himself  with  the  rural  pursuits  which 
he  loved  best,  attended  magistrates'  meetings  at  the  Quarter 
Sessions,  and  was  active  as  a  farmer.  '  Few  persons,'  said  an 
old  shepherd,  'could  compete  with  my  Lord  in  the  knowledge 
of  sheep.'  He  delighted  to  see  a  whole  flock  pass,  and  seemed 
to  know  them  as  if  he  had  lived  with  them." 

"  Of  all  my  former  pursuits,"  he  wrote,  after  Lady  Althorp's 
death,  and  in  the  midst  of  his  grief,  "the  only  one  in  which  I 
now  take  interest  is  in  breeding  stock;  it  is  the  only  one  in 
which  I  can  build  castles  in  the  air." 

"  Lord  Althorp  was  wise,"  says  Walter  Bagehot,  summing  up 
a  review  of  his  character,  "with  the  solid  wisdom  of  agricultural 
England ;  popular  and  useful ;  sagacious  in  usual  things ;  a 
model  in  common  duties  ;  well  able  to  advise  in  the  daily 
difficulties  which  are  the  staple  of  human  life.  But  beyond 
this  he  could  not  go.  Having  no  ability  to  decide  on  more 
intellectual  questions,  he  was  distressed  and  pained  when  he 
had  to  do  so.  He  was  a  man  picturesquely  out  of  place  in  a 
great  scene;  and  it  was  his  personal  misfortune  (though  a 
blessing  to  the  country)  that  the  simplicity  of  his  purposes, 
and  the  reliability  of  his  character,  raised  him  at  a  great 
conjunction  to  a  high  place  for  which  nature  had  not  meant 
him,  and  for  which  he  felt  that  she  had  not." 

The  next  character  on  our  list  in  connection  with  the 
Reform  Bill  is  a  man  altogether  different  from  Lord 
Althorp,  —  a  man  brilliant  as  a  comet,  and  about  as  unde- 
finable ;  a  man  vain  with  a  vanity  that  sometimes  seemed 
to  border  on  insanity ;  a  man  dreaded  by  his  friends,  who 
never  knew  what  he  might  do  next,  but  with  talents  that 
needed  only  to  have  been  balanced  by  steadiness  of  char- 
acter to  make  him  one  of  the  greatest  Englishmen  that 
ever  lived,  —  I  mean  Henry,  Lord  Brougham. 

"  Punch  "  persecuted  him  for  fifteen  years,  and  he  did 


112    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

not  like  it.  Probably  during  that  period  there  was  not 
a  number  published  in  which  he  in  his  checked  trousers 
did  not  somewhere  appear.  He  is  even  on  one  of  the 
titlepages,  —  a  little  floating  angel,  in  checked  trousers 
still.  But  afterwards  "  Punch  "  repented,  and  dropped  him. 

He  was  born  on  Scottish  soil,  and  his  boyhood  was 
passed  in  Scotland.  He  came  of  an  old  Westmoreland 
family,  mixed  Norman  and  Saxon,  —  Vaux  and  Brougham; 
but  his  mother,  as  he  liked  to  tell,  was  of  the  Celtic  race, 
a  niece  of  Robertson  the  historian.  Of  the  same  family 
came  the  mother  of  Mr.  Gladstone.  The  family  had 
settled  in  the  Shetland  Isles.  Brougham  was  far  more  the 
Celt  than  the  Englishman,  and  he  valued  his  Celtic  origin. 
At  a  very  early  age  he  had  learned  to  read ;  but  a  putrid 
fever  wiped  all  his  acquirements  from  his  memory,  even 
his  knowledge  of  his  letters.  He  was  a  grave,  sad  little 
boy,  whose  chief  pleasure  at  play  was  to  act  scenes  in 
court,  and  be  an  imaginary  Lord  Chancellor.  After  his 
recovery  and  the  restoration  of  his  memory,  he  was  sent 
to  various  schools  in  Edinburgh.  His  great  desire  was 
for  knowledge.  From  his  earliest  years  he  had  a  re- 
markable aptitude  for  asking  questions.  He  would  put 
anybody,  who  had  information  that  "he  wanted,  through 
keen  cross-examination.  In  classics  he  was  a  proficient, 
but  in  science  he  was  no  less  wonderful.  French  he 
spoke  so  perfectly  that  abroad  he  has  been  taken  for  a 
Frenchman,  and  much  of  his  time  in  his  later  life  was 
passed  on  a  property  he  bought  at  Cannes. 

One  of  his  schoolmasters  at  Edinburgh  was  Dr.  Adam, 
whose  miserable  income,  on  first  starting  in  life,  had  been 
^3  a  quarter,  —  a  dollar  a  week.  His  lodging  cost  eight 
cents  a  week.  It  was  four  miles  from  his  college.  He  lived 
on  oatmeal  and  a  pennyworth  of  bread  daily.  Fire  and 
candle  were  luxuries  beyond  his  reach.  When  very  cold  he 
ran  up  and  down  the  long  staircase  of  his  lodging-house 
to  warm  himself.  All,  that  by  these  means,  he  could 
save  out  of  his  dollar  a  week  he  spent  in  books  for  study. 
It  was  under  this  man  that  Brougham  acquired  not  only 


LORD  BROUGHAM.  113 

learning,  but  industry,  self-reliance,  and  an  intense  love 
of  study. 

At  sixteen,  Brougham  wrote  an  article  on  the  Refraction 
of  Light,  and  shortly  after  sent  in  a  paper  on  the  same  sub- 
ject to  be  read  at  the  Royal  Society.  Unfortunately  the 
reader  omitted  some  passages  as  too  extravagant.  These 
contained  the  germ  idea  of  photography. 

But  Brougham  was  by  no  means  all  student ;  he  wrote  a 
romance.1  He  was  convivial  beyond  anything  the  present 
age  can  conceive  of.  He  wrenched  knockers  off  doors  when 
a  collegian,  and  played  at  "  high  jinks  "  generally.  One  of 
his  exploits  was,  at  dead  of  night,  to  wrench  a  gilt  serpent 
from  the  front  of  a  druggist's  shop,  where  it  was  put  up  as  a 
sign.  He  and  his  fellow  mischief-makers  were  discovered 
by  a  watchman  in  the  execution  of  this  feat,  and  had  to 
save  themselves  by  a  breathless  run.  At  the  age  of  ninety 
the  ex-Chancellor  chuckled  over  the  remembrance  of  this 
deviltry. 

He  adopted  law  as  his  profession,  but  at  first  he  professed 
to  hate  it.  He  wrote  of  it  as  "  the  cursedest  of  all  profes- 
sions." He  wanted  to  be  a  diplomatist,  but  no  opening 
presented  itself,  though  from  the  first  he  was  resolved  to 
combine  his  law  with  politics.  His  maxims  as  a  lawyer  were  : 
First,  to  sacrifice  every  consideration  to  the  cause  of  his 
client ;  secondly,  to  consider  no  cause  beneath  his  notice. 

In  1816  he  was  sent  to  Portugal  on  a  mission  from  the 
Government.  Next  he  got  into  Parliament,  and  distin- 
guished himself  in  the  debates  on  slavery.  In  1820  he  was 
the  most  brilliant  defender  of  Queen  Caroline,  and  had  long 
been  her  legal  adviser.  While  the  Queen's  trial  was  at  its 
height  he  ran  down  for  one  day  to  York  to  defend  the  rights 
of  a  poor  widow  who  rented  a  pigstye  at  sixpence  a  year. 
Her  landlord  had  pulled  down  the  pigstye,  and  Brougham 
recovered  for  his  client  eight  dollars  damages,  after  which 
he  rushed  back  to  London  to  defend  the  defamed  virtue  of 
the  Queen. 

1  His  Autobiography,  written  towards  the  end  of  his  life,  is  con 
sidered  highly  imaginative. 


114   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

In  1830,  after  distinguishing  himself  by  his  unrivalled  elo- 
quence in  the  House  of  Commons,  he  was  made  Lord 
Chancellor,  in  the  ministry  formed  by  Lord  Grey.  Such 
a  hare-brained  Chancellor  was  a  curious  spectacle,  but  he 
proved  a  most  industrious  and  omniscient  one.  Never  but 
once,  after  entering  the  House  of  Lords,  would  he  set  foot 
in  the  scene  of  his  former  triumphs,  the  House  of  Com- 
mons. More  than  a  quarter  of  a  century  later,  when  he  was 
nearly  ninety,  he  went  in,  leaning  on  a  friend's  arm.  From 
the  door  that  led  from  the  Upper  House  he  gazed  on  the 
stirring  scene  a  moment  or  two ;  and  then  the  tears  rose  in 
his  eyes,  and  he  murmured  to  his  friend  :  "  Take  me  away  ! 
Take  me  away  !  There  is  not  a  face  I  recognize.  Dead  ! 
—  dead  !  All  gone  !  " 

The  actual  material  House  of  Commons  which  he  then 
entered  was  not  the  building  in  which  he  had  made  his 
brilliant  oratorical  displays.  That  House  had  been  burned 
down  in  1834.  Parliament  had  to  take  refuge  in  St.  Ste- 
phen's Chapel,  Westminster,  till  its  new  houses  were  built. 
The  cause  of  the  fire  was  very  curious,  very  English  and  con- 
servative. In  ancient  times  the  votes  on  any  question  had 
been  kept  by  notches  cut  on  sticks,  which  were  called  tallies. 
Each  member  as  he  voted  had  a  notch  cut.  This  custom 
continued  down  to  1834,  and  the  old  tally-sticks  had  grown 
so  numerous  that  they  were  ordered  to  be  burnt,  by  a  vote 
of  the  House.  That  burning  set  fire  to  the  Houses  of  Par- 
liament, and  England  paid  heavily  for  her  devotion  to  an 
obsolete  custom. 

William  Cobbett's  is  the  third  name  on  our  list.  He  had 
nothing  in  a  Parliamentary  point  of  view  to  do  with  the 
passage  of  the  Reform  Bill,  but  no  man  in  England  had  so 
much  influence  on  that  state  of  opinion  and  feeling  outside 
of  Parliament  which  led  to  its  passage. 

On  the  borders  of  Berkshire  and  Hampshire,  not  very  far 
from  Aldershot,  on  the  edge  of  a  wild  moor,  and  about  six 
miles  from  the  old  town  of  Farnham,  where  the  palace  of 
the  Bishop  of  Winchester  stands,  is  a  little  village  so  prim- 
itive that  in  1844  an  hour-glass  hung  over  the  pulpit  in  its 


WILLIAM  COBBETT.  115 

church,  and  Punch  and  Judy,  having  visited  the  place,  were 
invited  -to  stay  over  Sunday  and  assist  the  choir.  It  is  within 
a  drive  of  Swift's  Moor  Park,  of  the  old  Monastery  of  Wa- 
verley,  and  of  White's  Selborne.  No  words  can  describe 
the  beauty  of  the  moors  in  autumn,  covered  with  gorse  and 
purple  heather.  On  a  little  cultivated  knoll  on  the  edge  of 
this  moorland  stood  the  thatched  cottage  of  Cobbett's  grand- 
mother. His  grandfather  had  been  a  day  laborer,  and 
worked  forty  years  for  the  same  employer;  his  son  rose 
somewhat  in  the  world.  He  owned  a  little  house  and  some 
land  near  Farnham,  and  kept  a  sort  of  public-house,  —  The 
Jolly  Farmer.1  He  had  three  boys  whom  he  taught  to  read 
and  cipher  on  winter  evenings.  During  the  day  he  sent 
them  into  the  fields  to  scare  birds  for  neighboring  farmers. 
Cobbett  was  so  little  when  he  had  to  do  this  work  that  he 
tells  us,  "  I  could  hardly  climb  the  stiles  without  assistance, 
and  often  found  it  difficult  to  get  home." 

Cobbett  is  his  own  best  biographer ;  for  although  he  never 
sat  down  to  write  his  memoirs,  his  writings  are  full  of  auto- 
biographical reminiscences. 

"  With  regard  to  my  ancestors,"  he  tells  us,  "  I  shall  go  not 
further  back  than  my  grandfather,  and  for  this  plain  reason,  I 
never  knew  any  other  prior  to  him.  .  .  .  He  died  before  I  was 
born;  but  I  have  often  slept  beneath  the  same  roof  that  sheltered 
him,  and  where  his  widow  dwelt  for  many  years  after  his  death. 
It  was  a  little  thatched  cottage,  with  a  garden  before  the  door. 
It  had  but  two  windows.  A  damson-tree  shaded  one,  and  a 
clump  of  filberts  the  other.  Here  I  and  my  brothers  went. every 
Christmas  or  Whitsuntide  to  spend  a  week  or  two,  and  torment 
the  poor  old  woman  with  our  noise  and  dilapidations.  She  used 
to  give  us  milk  and  bread  for  breakfast,  and  apple-pudding  for 
dinner,  and  a  piece  of  bread  and  cheese  for  our  supper.  Her  fire 
was  made  of  turf  cut  from  the  heath,  and  her  light  was  from  a 
rush  dipped  in  grease.  .  .  .  My  father  used  to  boast  that  he  had 
four  boys,  the  eldest  of  whom  was  but  fifteen  years  old,  who  did 
as  much  work  as  any  three  men  in  the  parish  of  Farnham.  I  do 
not  remember  the  time  when  I  did  not  earn  my  own  living.  My 

1  Among  the  queer  names  of  roadside  inns  that  I  have  seen  in 
that  neighborhood  was  one  called  Tumble-Down  Dick,  in  derision  of 
Richard  Cromwell. 


Il6    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

first  employment  was  scaring  birds,  my  next  was  weeding  and 
tending  a  single  horse  at  harrowing  barley.  Hoeing  peas  fol- 
lowed; and  thence  I  arrived  at  the  honor  of  joining  the  reapers 
in  harvest,  driving  the  team,  and  holding  the  plough." 

Of  the  diversions  of  his  boy-life  he  tells  us  :  — 

"One  diversion  was  this  :  we  used  to  go  to  the  top  of  a  hill 
which  was  steeper  than  the  roof  of  a  house.  One  used  to  draw 
his  arms  out  of  the  sleeves  of  his  smock-frock,  and  lay  himself 
down,  with  his  arms  at  his  sides,  and  then  the  others,  one  at 
head  and  one  at  foot,  sent  him  rolling  down  the  hill  like  a  bar- 
rel or  a  log  of  wood.  By  the  time  he  got  to  the  bottom,  his 
hair,  eyes,  ears,  and  nose  and  mouth  were  all  full  of  this  loose 
sand ;  then  the  others  took  their  turn,  and  at  every  roll  there 
was  a  monstrous  spell  of  laughter.  .  .  .  Thus  was  I  receiving 
my  education,  and  this  was  the  sort  of  education  ;  and  I  am  per- 
fectly satisfied  that  if  I  had  not  received  such  an  education,  or 
something  like  it,  that  if  I  had  been  brought  up  a  milksop  with 
a  nursery-maid  everlastingly  at  my  heels,  I  should  have  been 
at  this  day  as  great  a  fool,  as  insufficient  a  mortal,  as  any  of 
those  frivolous  idiots  that  are  turned  out  of  Winchester  or 
Westminster  school,  or  any  of  those  dens  of  dunces  called  col- 
leges or  universities.  It  is  impossible  to  say  how  much  I  owe 
to  that  sand-hill ;  and  in  later  life  I  went  to  return  it  my  thanks 
for  the  ability  which  it  probably  gave  me  to  become  one  of  the 
greatest  terrors  and  one  of  the  greatest  and  most  powerful 
enemies  of  those  knaves  and  fools  that  are  permitted  to  afflict 
this  or  any  other  country." 

I  have  quoted  all  this  passage  because  it  gives  a  good 
idea  of  Cobbett  and  his  style  of  writing,  his  plain  straight- 
forwardness of  speech,  his  art  of  drawing  landscape  sketches, 
his  boastfulness,  his  ignorance,  his  arrogance,  his  want  of 
sympathy  with  all  that  was  outside  his  own  sphere  and 
experience,  and  his  mastery  of  the  art  of  unsparing  invec- 
tive. When  he  indulges  in  this  last,  each  sentence  cuts 
like  a  lash. 

On  winter  evenings  his  father  taught  him  reading  and 
writing. 

"  I  have  some  faint  recollection,"  he  says,  "  of  going  to  school 
to  an  old  woman  who,  I  believe,  did  not  succeed  in  teaching  me 
my  letters.  ...  As  to  politics,  we  were  like  the  rest  of  the 


WILLIAM  COBBETT.  1 1 7 

country  people  in  England,  —  that  is  to  say,  we  neither  knew 
nor  thought  anything  about  the  matter.  The  shouts  of  victory 
or  the  murmur  of  a  defeat  would  now  and  then  break  in  on  our 
tranquillity  for  a  moment,  but  I  do  not  ever  remember  seeing  a 
newspaper  in  my  father's  house.  ...  At  eleven  years  of  age 
my  employment  was  clipping  box-edgings  and  weeding  beds  of 
flowers  in  the  garden  of  the  Bishop  of  Winchester  at  the  Castle 
of  Farnham,  my  native  town.  I  had  always  been  fond  of  beau- 
tiful gardens,  and  a  gardener  who  had  just  come  from  the  King's 
gardens  at  Kew  gave  such  a  description  of  them  as  made  me 
instantly  resolve  to  work  in  those  gardens." 

He  ran  away  from  home,  therefore,  and  one  evening  in 
June,  1773,  he  reached  Richmond,  with  three  pennies  in 
his  pocket.  He  says  :  — 

"  I  was  trudging  through  Richmond  in  my  blue  smock-frock 
and  my  red  garters  tied  under  my  knees,  when,  staring  about 
me,  my  eyes  fell  on  a  little  book  in  a  bookseller's  window,  on 
the  outside  of  which  was  written,  '  The  Tale  of  a  Tub,'  price 
threepence.  The  title  was  so  odd  that  curiosity  was  excited." 

Instead  of  supper  or  a  night's  lodging,  he  bought  Swift's 
little  book  and  carried  it  under  a  haystack. 

"  It  was  something  so  new  to  my  mind,"  says  he,  "  that 
although  I  could  not  at  all  understand  some  of  it,  it  delighted 
me  beyond  description,  and  it  produced  what  I  have  always 
considered  a  birth  of  intellect.  I  read  on  till  it  was  dark,  with- 
out any  thought  of  supper  or  bed.  When  I  could  see  no  longer, 
I  put  my  little  book  in  my  pocket,  and  tumbled  down  by  the  side 
of  the  stack,  where  I  slept  till  the  birds  in  Kew  Gardens  wak- 
ened me  in  the  morning,  when  off  I  started  for  Kew,  reading 
my  little  book.  The  singularity  of  my  dress,  the  simplicity  of 
my  manners,  my  confident  and  lively  air,  and.  doubtless,  his  own 
compassion  besides,  induced  the  gardener,  who  was  a  Scotch- 
man, to  give  me  victuals,  find  me  lodging,  and  set  me  to  work. 
One  day  the  Prince  of  Wales  (afterwards  George  IV.)  and  one 
of  his  brothers  laughed  at  the  oddness  of  my  dress  while  I  was 
sweeping  the  grass-plot  in  front  of  the  pagoda." 

Twice  afterwards  he  ran  away  from  home,  —  once  to 
Portsmouth,  where  he  offered  himself  as  a  sailor  on  board 
a  man-of-war;  and  afterwards  on  an  impulse  he  climbed 


Il8    ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

on  a  stage-coach  that  was  passing,  and  went  up  to  London. 
Here  one  of  his  fellow-passengers,  taking  pity  on  him,  got 
him  writing  to  do  in  a  lawyer's  office ;  but  this  was  so  dis- 
tasteful to  him  that,  seeing  a  placard  addressed,  "  To  Spirited 
Young  Men,"  he  went  down  to  Chatham,  the  great  recruit- 
ing station,  and  enlisted  in  a  foot  regiment.  At  Chatham  for 
the  first  time  in  his  life  he  had  leisure  to  read.  "  But  that 
reading  and  writing  had  all  to  be  done  amidst  the  talking, 
laughing,  whistling,  singing,  and  brawling  of  idle  soldiers." 

He  suffered  often,  too,  from  downright  hunger.  His  pay 
was  sixpence  a  day,  out  of  which  he  had  to  find  food, 
clothes,  washing,  hair-powder,  and  pipe-clay.  The  whole 
week's  food  was  not  a  bit  too  much  for  one  day.  One 
Friday  he  had  managed  to  economize  a  halfpenny.  He  de- 
termined to  buy  a  red  herring  on  Saturday  morning ;  but 
as  he  undressed  he  found  he  had  lost  the  money.  "  I 
buried  my  head,"  he  wrote,  nearly  fifty  years  after,  "  under 
the  miserable  sheet  and  rug,  and  cried  like  a  child." 

But  his  abilities  and  his  knowledge  of  reading  and  writ- 
ing raised  him  rapidly  in  his  regiment,  which  was  sent  to 
Nova  Scotia.'  His  officers  gladly  employed  him  in  all  kinds 
of  business.  They  saw  in  him,  too,  a  smart  soldier,  and 
he  soon  rose  to  be  sergeant-major.  His  next  step  might 
have  been  a  commission.  It  was  at  this  time  that  he 
met  his  wife,  the  wife  who  survived  him,  and  whom  he 
cherished  with  the  most  loyal  affection  for  forty-two  years. 

When  he  first  saw  her  she  was  thirteen  years  old,  the 
daughter  of  a  sergeant-major  in  the  artillery.  The  story 
seems  to  me  an  idyl  in  common  life.  I  quote  it  from  one 
of  his  volumes. 

"  I  sat  in  the  same  room  with  her  for  about  an  hour  in  com- 
pany with  others,  and  I  made  up  my  mind  she  was  the  very 
girl  for  me.  That  I  thought  her  beautiful  is  certain,  —  for  that 
I  always  said  should  be  an  indispensable  qualification ;  but  I 
saw  in  her  what  I  deemed  marks  of  that  sobriety  of  conduct  of 
which  I  have  said  so  much,  and  which  has  been  by  far  the  great- 
est blessing  of  my  life.  It  was  now  dead  of  winter,  and  of  course 
the  snow  several  feet  deep  on  the  ground,  and  the  weather  pier- 
cing cold.  It  was  my  habit  (I  rose  at  four  o'clock)  when  I  had 


WJLLIAM  COBBETT.  119 

done  my  morning's  writing,  to  go  out  at  break  of  day  and  take  a 
walk  on  a  hill,  at  the  foot  of  which  our  barracks  stood.  ...  It 
was  hardly  light,  but  she  was  out  in  the  snow  scrubbing  out  a 
washing-tub.  '  That 's  the  girl  for  me ! '  I  said,  when  I  was  out 
of  her  hearing." 

They  were  engaged ;  but  her  father's  regiment  soon  after 
was  ordered  to  England.  Cobbett  gave  her  the  ^£150  that 
he  had  saved,  desiring  her  not  to  spare  the  money,  but  to 
get  herself  good  clothes,  and  live  without  hard  work. 

It  was  four  years  before  he  again  saw  her,  "  and  then," 
he  says,  "  I  found  my  little  girl  a  servant  of  all  work  (and 
hard  work  it  was),  at  ^5  a  year  ($25),  in  the  house  of  a 
Captain  Brissac  ;  and  without  hardly  saying  a  word  about 
the  matter,  she  put  into  my  hands  the  whole  of  my  ,£150 
unbroken." 

This  was  in  1792.  Cobbett  got  his  discharge,  and  forth- 
with married,  bringing  a  charge  he  was  unable  to  substan- 
tiate against  officers  of  his  regiment  for  misappropriating 
regimental  money.  He  decided  after  this  to  take  back  his 
young  wife  to  America.  They  settled  in  Philadelphia.  It 
was  in  those  days  that  Genet,  ambassador  from  France,  and 
a  fierce  Jacobin,  was  stirring  up  strife  in  American  politics. 
Washington  and  the  Federal  party  were  accused  of  leanings 
towards  England  and  despotism.  Jefferson  and  his  party 
sympathized  with  France  and  her  Revolution.  A  split  in 
the  cabinet  took  place  on  this  question,  and  the  whole 
country  was  divided.  France  and  the  Revolution  was  the 
popular  side,  but  Cobbett  chose  to  pose  as  an  extreme 
Englishman.  He  opened  a  bookseller's  shop  in  Phila- 
delphia, flaming  with  portraits  of  George  III.  and  Pitt, 
"and  every  picture,"  he  says,  "that  I  thought  likely  to 
excite  the  rage  of  the  enemies  of  Great  Britain."  He 
also  began  to  issue  a  paper,  which  he  wrote  all  himself, 
"The  Porcupine  Gazette,"  the  spirit  of  which  may  be 
judged  from  the  title  of  its  most  celebrated  article,  "A 
Kick  for  a  Bite."  If  Cobbett  gave  kicks,  he  got  bites  too. 
Many  libel  suits  were  brought  against  him  for  his  violent 
language,  —  one  by  the  Spanish  minister ;  one  by  Dr.  Rush, 


I2O    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

whom  he  had  called  Sangrado  for  his  treatment  of  yellow 
fever.  For  this  he  was  fined  $5000  and  costs.  This 
broke  him  up,  and  he  quitted  Philadelphia,  shaking  off 
his  feet  the  dust  of  the  City  of  Brotherly  Love. 

On  his  return  to  England  he  began  by  writing  High  Tory 
political  articles  in  the  interest  of  Mr.  Pitt;  but  he  soon 
changed  his  politics,  nobody  knows  exactly  why.  I  think 
that  a  man  of  his  stamp  would  be  fiercely  English  upon 
foreign  soil,  and  fiercely  critical  and  intolerant  on  return- 
ing to  his  own  country. 

"  Cobbett  was  forty,"  says  an  article  upon  him  in  "  Eraser's 
Magazine,"  "  when  he  set  up  his  '  Political  Register,'  and  he 
soon  became  a  political  power  in  the  state,  and  a  thorn, 
or  rather  a  whole  bunch  of  thorns,  in  the  side  of  the  min- 
istry, —  indeed  of  every  ministry  all  his  life  in  turn."  He 
became  "  an  Ishmaelite  of  the  political  world ;  the  Ther- 
sites  of  journalism ;  "  and  throughout  all  his  savage  politi- 
cal career  he  was  ever  "  an  excellent  husband,  an  exemplary 
father,  a  genuine  patriot  at  heart ;  he  had  fancy  and  feel- 
ing, with  a  keen  sense  of  moral  and  natural  beauty ;  he  had 
indomitable  energy  and  strong  good  sense ;  he  was  largely 
endued  with  civil  courage;  and  his  style  is  simply  inimi- 
table," when  not  disgraced  by  ferocity  of  speech. 

He  never  claimed  consistency.  He  fought  on  whatever 
side  commended  itself  to  his  state  of  feeling.  He  was 
furious  against  Catholic  Emancipation,  but  he  grieved  over 
the  dissolution  of  the  monasteries,  and  wrote  of  Good 
Queen  Mary  and  Bloody  Queen  Bess.  Sir  Francis  Bur- 
dett  and  a  leading  nobleman  had  been  his  friends  through 
evil  report  and  good  report ;  the  former  lending  him  money 
which  was  never  repaid.  Both  were  attacked,  when  the 
occasion  offered,  with  all  the  stinging  epithets  which  flowed 
so  readily  from  his  tongue  or  pen.  The  American  Repub- 
lic was  sometimes  "  the  only  land  worth  living  in ;  "  at 
others  he  called  it  "  a  land  where  judges  became  felons, 
and  felons  judges."  Tom  Paine  had  once  been  to  him 
"  a  hideous  miscreant ;  "  afterwards  he  proposed  to  make 
political  amulets  of  his  hair  and  bones. 


WILLIAM  COBBETT.  121 

For  all  the  abuses  he  attacked  from  1801  to  1832,  his 
panacea  was  Parliamentary  Reform.  He  formed  associa- 
tions for  Reform,  he  lectured  for  Reform,  he  pressed 
Reform  on  all  his  readers  (and  they  amounted  weekly  to 
some  hundred  thousand).  Over  the  top  of  his  paper 
was  always  set  a  woodcut  of  a  gridiron,  because  he  had 
said  he  would  rather  be  roasted  to  death  than  give  up  the 
cause  of  Reform. 

In  1829-30,  during  the  height  of  the  Reform  agitation, 
he  made  a  horseback  journey  through  England,  lecturing 
on  Reform  in  all  the  towns  and  villages.  "  His  main 
topics  were  the  villany  of  existing  modes  of  taxation,  and 
of  the  funding  principle,  and  the  effect  of  these  on  the 
farming  interests ;  also  the  accursed  rotten  boroughs.  .  .  . 
He  was  against  standing  armies,  paper  money,  and  national 
debt,  modern  shop-keeping,  and  locomotion  and  modern 
London.  .  .  .  He  abhorred  Jews,  Methodists,  Quakers, 
bishops,  and  Malthusians."  His  opinions  were  usually  on 
a  rational  foundation,  but  built  up  into  ill- balanced  and 
grotesque  edifices,  lop-sided  and  untenable.  One  result 
of  his  lecturing  tour  on  horseback  was  the  publication  of 
a  book  unrivalled  for  its  pictures  of  English  scenery  and 
manners,  "  Cobbett's  Rural  Ride  through  England." 

Several  times,  during  the  period  from  1801  to  1832,  his 
"  Register  "  got  him  into  prison,  when  he,  or  his  friends  for 
him,  paid  heavy  fines.  Once  he  went  to  America,  and 
lived  a  year  on  Long  Island.  He  came  back  enthusiastic 
about  the  cultivation  of  Indian  corn,  which  to  this  day 
is  called  "  Cobbett's  corn  "  in  England.  I  remember  when 
attempts  were  made  to  raise  it  in  English  vegetable 
gardens ;  but  the  best  efforts  produced  only  a  few  nubbins. 
He  prophesied  that  England  would  be  ruined  by  the 
"accursed  root,"  as  he  always  called  the  potato. 

He  owned  a  charming  farm  at  Botley,  in  Hampshire,  —  a 
part  of  England  in  which  he  had  had  his  early  home.  He 
endeavored  to  live  there  as  the  model  farmer  of  the  olden 
time.  All  kinds  of  guests  flocked  thither,  and,  like  dear 
Sir  Walter  Scott,  his  means  were  insufficient  to  stand  such 


122   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

promiscuous  hospitality.  Like  Scott,  too,  he  loved  dogs, 
and  took  delight  in  the  planting  of  trees. 

This  happy  home  was  broken  up  by  his  conviction  and 
sentence  to  two  years'  imprisonment  in  Newgate  for  libel. 
Ten  years  exactly  from  the  day  when  he  had  lost  a  fortune 
in  America  for  a  so-called  libel  on  Dr.  Rush,  he  stood 
up  in  Westminster  Hall  to  be  sentenced  to  a  fine  of 
^1000  and  two  years'  imprisonment. 

In  later  life  he  bought  another  farm  not  far  from  Farn- 
ham  ;  but  it  was  never  dear  to  him  as  Botley  had  been.  The 
one  friend  with  whom  he  never  seems  to  have  quarrelled 
was  Lord  Cochrane.  Hazlitt,  another  remarkable  reformer, 
and  keen  hater,  of  that  period,  has  drawn  Cobbett's  portrait. 

"  Mr.  Cobbett,"  he  says,  "  speaks  almost  as  well  as  he  writes. 
The  only  time  I  ever  saw  him  he  seemed  to  me  a  very  pleasant 
man,  easy  of  access,  affable,  clear-headed,  simple  and  mild  in 
his  manners,  deliberate  and  unruffled  in  his  speech,  though 
some  of  his  expressions  were  not  very  qualified.  His  figure 
was  tall  and  portly.  He  had  a  good  sensible  face,  rather  full, 
with  little  gray  eyes,  a  hard,  square  forehead,  a  ruddy  com- 
plexion, with  hair  gray  or  powdered,  and  had  on  a  scarlet 
broadcloth  waistcoat,  with  the  flaps  of  the  pockets  hanging 
down,  as  was  the  custom  for  gentleman  farmers  in  the  last 
century,  or  as  we  see  it  in  pictures  of  members  of  Parliament 
in  the  reign  of  George  I.  I  certainly  did  not  think  less  favor- 
ably of  him  for  seeing  him." 

In  the  first  Reformed  Parliament,  Cobbett  sat  for  Old- 
ham.  He  distinguished  himself  very  little  in  the  House,  — 
indeed,  he  was  too  old  to  begin  there.  In  the  middle  of 
May,  1835,  he  made  his  last  speech,  in  favor  of  the  agri- 
cultural interest,  and  against  the  manufacturers.  His 
throat  was  so  sore  that  his  words  were  hardly  audible, 
and  two  days  later,  at  his  own  farm,  he  quietly  died. 

"  I  have  seven  children,"  he  once  said.  "  I  never  struck 
one  of  them  in  anger  in  my  life,  and  I  recollect  'only  one  single 
instance  in  which  I  have  ever  spoken  to  one  of  them  in  a  really 
angry  tone  and  manner.  And  when  I  had  done  so  it  appeared 
as  if  my  heart  had  really  gone  out  of  my  body.  It  was  but  once, 


WILLIAM  COBBETT.  123 

and  it  will  never  be  again.  ...  In  my  whole  life  I  never  spent 
one  evening  away  from  my  own  home  without  some  part  at 
least  of  my  family,  unless  I  was  at  a  great  distance  from  that 
home." 

Cobbett  was  so  typical  an  Englishman,  and  is  so  indis- 
solubly  associated  with  Reform,  that  I  have  given  a  sketch 
of  his  life  at  more  length  than  he  might  rightly  claim, 
perhaps,  in  these  pages. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE   ACCESSION  AND   CORONATION   OF   QUEEN   VICTORIA.  — 
LORD   MELBOURNE. 

*TPHE  remaining  years  of  the  reign  of  William  IV.  were 
•^  chiefly  marked  by  secret  intrigues  among  the  Court 
party  to  get  rid  of  a  Whig  ministry,  and  put  in  place  of 
Lord  Grey  or  Lord  Melbourne  the  Duke  of  Wellington  and 
Sir  Robert  Peel.  These  manoeuvres,  as  we  have  seen,  would 
have  succeeded  in  1835,  had  the  Duke  of  Wellington  be- 
lieved it  possible  to  induce  the  House  of  Commons  to 
support  a  Tory  ministry.  As  it  was,  the  Whigs  had,  of 
necessity,  to  retain  office,  and  a  new  cabinet  was  formed 
under  the  premiership  of  Lord  Melbourne,  who  remained 
in  office  for  six  years. 

The  picturesque  particulars  attending  the  accession  of 
Queen  Victoria  have  been  already  so  excellently  told  by 
Mr.  Justin  McCarthy  (who  commences  with  them  his  ad- 
mirable "  History  of  our  Own  Times  "),  and  by  Mr.  Charles 
Greville,  Clerk  of  the  Privy  Council,  that  nothing  seems 
left  for  me  to  do  but  to  throw  on  it  a  few  faint  side-lights 
of  personal  reminiscence. 

As  we  all  know,  Princess  Victoria  —  christened  Alexan- 
drina1  Victoria,  and  happily  not  Alexandrina  Georgeanna, 
as  had  been  at  first  proposed  —  was  only  daughter  of 
Edward,  Duke  of  Kent,  fourth  son  of  George  III.  His 
three  elder  brothers,  George  IV.,  the  Duke  of  York,  and 
King  William  IV.,  died  childless ;  the  daughter  of  the  next 

1  In  the  school-books  of  my  childhood  she  is  called  invariably 
Princess  Alexandrina. 


QUEEN  VICTORIA. 
( In  her  Coronation  Robes. ) 


THE  ACCESSION  OF  QUEEN   VICTORIA.         12$ 

brother  took  precedence  therefore  of  her  uncles  as  heiress 
to  the  English  throne. 

Queen  Victoria  was  born  May  24,  1819,  at  Kensington 
Palace,  and  on  the  day  of  her  accession,  June  20,  1837, 
she  was  a  month  more  than  eighteen  years  old.  Had  Wil- 
liam IV.  died  a  few  weeks  earlier,  there  must  have  been  a 
Regency,  with  probably  heart-burnings  among  the  Royal 
uncles,  because  the  Queen's  mother  would  have  been  at  its 
head. 

On  the  i  pth  of  June,  1837,  my  father,  mother,  and 
myself,  went  with  a  party  of  American  friends  to  visit 
Richmond,  where  we  dined  at  its  celebrated  inn,  The  Star 
and  Garter.  As  we  were  sitting  over  our  dessert,  a  waiter 
came  up  to  us,  twisting  his  napkin  in  his  hand,  and  whis- 
pered solemnly  that  news  had  come  from  Windsor  that  the 
King  was  dying,  and  that  by  morning  the  young  Queen 
would  be  upon  the  throne. 

How  the  talk  changed  at  once  !  What  speculations  there 
were  around  our  table  about  the  girl  princess,  of  whom  the 
world  in  general  knew  absolutely  nothing  !  She  had  only 
once  appeared  at  court ;  she  had  never  been  seen  in  public 
places ;  no  portrait  of  her  was  well  known,  except  one 
taken  when  she  was  a  mere  child,  with  cropped  hair  and  a 
coral  necklace.  It  was  agreed  that  she  would  be  wholly 
governed  by  her  mother,  the  Duchess  of  Kent,  who  was 
supposed  to  be  a  hard,  ambitious  woman.  Was  the  young 
Princess  in  good  health  ?  Would  she  live  ?  If  she  did  not, 
there  would  surely  be  a  revolution,  for  England  would  never 
bear  the  rule  of  the  next  heir  to  the  throne,  the  Duke  of 
Cumberland. 

So,  saddened  and  speculative,  we  drove  back  to  London. 
The  gentlemen  who  bore  the  chief  part  in  the  conversation 
never  dreamed  of  considering  the  child-queen  as  anything 
more  than  a  state  doll-baby.  They  never  attributed  to  her 
a  mind,  a  heart,  or  knowledge  and  intelligence  of  her  own. 
And  in  this  uncertainty  there  was  a  great  deal  of  public 
regret  for  William  IV.,  a  man  whom,  as  Justin  McCarthy 
says,  "  responsibility  had  seemed  to  improve."  He  him- 


126   ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

self  felt  for  his  country  much  the  same  fear  that  the  country 
seemed  to  fear  for  itself,  and  said,  with  pathetic  simplicity, 
upon  his  death-bed,  that  he  would  be  willing  to  live  ten 
years  more  for  the  good  of  his  country.  "  He  was  evidently 
under  the  sincere  conviction  that  England  could  not  do 
without  him  ;  "  and  to  keener,  more  experienced  eyes  the 
situation  seemed  very  doubtful. 

In  England  a  sovereign's  death  is  followed  by  three 
months'  general  mourning.  The  Sunday  after  King  Wil- 
liam's death  my  mother  and  I  went  to  St.  Pancras,  one  of 
the  largest  churches  in  London.  On  coming  out,  circum- 
stances compelled  us  to  stand  aside  till  all  the  congregation 
had  passed  us.  Not  a  soul  was  there  who  was  not  dressed 
in  decent  mourning.  William's  last  royal  act  had  been  to 
sign  a  pardon. 

He  died  at  Windsor  at  2  A.M.,  June  20,  1837,  and  at 
once  two  high  personages,  who  had  been  in  attendance 
on  his  death-bed,  set  off  to  bear  the  news  to  Kensington 
Palace.  They  were  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  and  the 
Lord  Chancellor.  They  reached  the  Palace  about  five 
o'clock,  and  pounded  on  the  door  some  time  in  vain.  At 
last  one  of  the  servants  let  them  into  a  room  upon  the 
lower  floor,  and  there  they  were  kept  waiting  because  the 
Princess  "  was  in  such  a  sweet  sleep  "  that  her  attendants 
did  not  like  to  rouse  her.  The  two  elderly  gentlemen, 
however,  insisted  that  their  errand  was  so  important  that 
she  must  be  disturbed.  In  a  few  minutes  she .  came  out  to 
them,  just  roused  from  sleep,  in  a  shawl  and  a  white  wrap- 
per, perfectly  collected  and  dignified.  They  did  homage 
to  her,  sent  for  the  Prime  Minister,  and  a  Council  was 
ordered  for  eleven  o'clock. 

Whence  shall  I  draw  my  narrative  of  what  took  place  at 
that  Council  ?  Greville's  most  interesting  pages  tell  of  it 
at  length,  and  Justin  McCarthy  has  copied  his  story ;  but 
Lord  Broughton  (Byron's  friend,  John  Cain  Hobhouse)  has 
told  the  same  thing  in  his  papers,  and,  as  these  are  less 
known  than  Greville's  record,  I  will  follow  his  narrative. 
He  says :  — 


THE  ACCESSION  OF  QUEEN  VICTORIA.         I2/ 

"  Arriving  at  the  Palace,  I  was  shown  into  the  antechamber 
of  the  Music  Room.  It  was  filled  with  Privy  Councillors 
standing  round  the  long  table,  set  in  order,  as  it  seemed,  for  a 
Council,  Sir  Robert  Peel  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington  on  the 
right,  near  the  head  of  the  table,  Lords  Melbourne  and  Lans- 
downe,  in  full  dress,  with  others  of  the  Whig  party,  on  the  left, 
near  the  top  of  the  table.  The  Duke  of  Argyle,  and  one  or  two 
officers  of  the  Household,  were  behind  the  arm-chair  at  the  top. 
There  were  nearly  ninety  Privy  Councillors  present,  —  so  I  was 
told.  After  a  little  time,  Lord  Lansdowne,  President  of  the 
Council,  advancing  to  the  table,  addressed  the  Lords  and  others 
of  the  Council,  and  informed  them  of  the  death  of  William  IV., 
and  announced  to  them  it  was  their  duty  to  inform  Her  Majesty 
Queen  Victoria  of  that  event,  and  of  her  accession.  He  added 
that  he,  accompanied  by  those  who  might  choose  to  assist  him, 
would  wait  upon  Her  Majesty.  Accordingly,  .Lord  Lansdowne 
and  Lord  Melbourne,  the  Duke  of  Cumberland  (now  King  of 
Hanover),  and  the  Duke  of  Sussex,  together  with  the  Arch- 
bishops of  Canterbury  and  York,  and  the  Lord  Chancellor, 
withdrew  through  the  folding  doors  behind  the  arm-chair,  and 
saw  the  Queen.  She  was  alone  ;  but  Lord  Lansdowne  told 
me  that  as  they  entered  they  saw  a  lady  retiring  into  the 
back  apartment.  Lord  Lansdowne  returned,  and  informed  the 
Council  they  had  seen  the  Queen.  .  .  .  Not  long  afterwards 
the  door  was  thrown  open,  and  the  Dukes  of  Sussex  and  Cum- 
berland (who  had  returned)  advanced  to  receive  Her  Majesty, 
and  the  young  creature  walked  in  and  took  her  seat  in  the  arm- 
chair. She  was  very  plainly  dressed  in  mourning,  —  a  black 
scarf  round  her  neck,  without  any  cap  or  ornament;  but  her 
hair  was  braided  tastily  on  the  top  of  her  head.  She  inclined 
herself  gracefully  on  taking  her  seat.  .  .  .  Soon  after  she  was 
seated  Lord  Melbourne  stepped  forward  and  presented  her 
with  a  paper,  from  which  she  read  her  declaration.  She  went 
through  this  difficult  task  with  the  utmost  grace  and  propriety,  — 
neither  too  timid  nor  too  assured.  Her  voice  was  rather  sub- 
dued, but  not  faltering,  pronouncing  the  words  clearly,  and 
seeming  to  feel  the  sense  of  what  she  spoke.  Every  one 
appeared  touched  with  her  manner,  especially  the  Duke  of 
Wellington  and  Lord  Melbourne  ;  I  saw  some  tears  in  the  eyes 
of  the  latter.  The  only  person  who  was  rather  more  curious 
than  affected  was  Lord  Lyndhurst,  who  looked  over  Her  Maj- 
esty's shoulder  as  she  was  reading,  as  if  to  see  that  she  read  all 
that  was  set  down  for  her. 

"  After  reading  the  Declaration,  Her  Majesty  took  the  usual 


128  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

oath,  which  'was  administered  to  her  by  Mr.  Charles  Greville, 
Clerk. of  the  Council,  who  by  the  way  let  the  Prayer-book  drop. 
The  Queen  then  subscribed  the  oath,  and  a  duplicate  of  it  for 
Scotland.  She  was  designated  in  the  beginning  of  the  oath 
Alexandrina  Victoria,  but  she  signed  herself  Victoria  R.  Her 
handwriting  was  good.  Several  of  the  Council  —  Lord  Lynd- 
hurst,  the  Duke  of  Cumberland,  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington  — 
came  to  the  table  to  look  at  the  signature,  as  if  to  discover  what 
her  accomplishments  were  in  that  department.  Some  formal 
Orders  in  Council  were  made,  and  proclamations  signed  by  the 
Queen,  who  addressed  Lords  Lansdowne  and  Melbourne  with 
smiles  several  times,  and  with  much  cordiality.  The  next 
part  of  the  ceremony  was  swearing  in  the  new  Privy  Council. 
A  cushion  was  placed  on  the  right  of  the  Queen's  chair,  and 
the  Dukes  of  Cumberland  and  Sussex  first  took  the  oaths. 
They  kissed  the  hand  of  the  Queen  ;  she  saluted  them  affec- 
tionately on  the  cheek.  She  had  kissed  them  before  in  the 
inner  apartment,  as  Lord  Lansdowne  told  me.  The  Arch- 
bishops and  Chancellor  were  then  sworn ;  after  them  Lords 
Lansdowne  and  Melbourne,  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington. 
After  that  they  swore  in  twenty  together.  There  was  a  good 
deal  of  bustle  and  noise  while  this  was  going  on.  .  .  .  The 
ceremony  over,  some  of  us  sat  down  to  the  Council  Table.  .  .  . 
During  this  time  the  doors  of  the  Chamber  were  opened  fre- 
quently, and  many  persons  admitted  to  see  the  young  Queen, 
who  continued  quietly  sitting  at  the  head  of  the  table,  giving 
her  approval  in  the  usual  form  to  several  Orders  in  Council. 

"  The  Proclamation  of  the  Queen's  accession  took  place  at 
St.  James'  Palace.  Her  Majesty  was  presented  to  the  people 
at  the  window  facing  Marlborough  House.  Lords  Melbourne 
and  Lansdowne  and  others  in  court  dresses  were  at  her  side, 
with  certain  great  officers  of  state  behind  her.  The  Duchess  of 
Kent  was  near  her  at  her  right.  The  crowd  was  very  great, 
but  composed  of  decently  dressed  people,  and  gave  Her  Majesty 
a  warm  reception." 

Daniel  O'Connell  was  prominent  on  this  occasion,  acting 
as  fugleman  to  the  cheers  of  the  crowd.  Lord  Broughton 
concludes  thus  (and  his  testimony  is  corroborated  by  all 
other  testimonies) :  — 

"  It  is  impossible  to  speak  too  highly  of  the  Queen's  demean- 
or and  conduct  during  the  whole  ceremony.  They  deserve 
all  that  has  been  said  of  them  by  all  parties,  and  must  have 


THE  ACCESSION  OF  QUEEN  VICTORIA.         129 

been  'the  offspring,  not  of  art,  not  of  education,  but  of  a  noble 
nature;'  to  use  the  words  of  the  eulogy  pronounced  on  them  by 
Sir  Robert  Peel." 

Lord  Broughton  also  remarks  that  "on  the  morning 
of  the  Queen's  accession  there  was  more  gloom  on  the 
faces  of  all  than  might  have  been  expected,  not  only 
among  Privy  Councillors,  but  generally." 

The  truth  is  the  apprehension  of  the  experiment  of  an 
untried  child  queen  weighed  heavily  upon  the  nation. 
Queen  Victoria,  as  I  have  said,  was  wholly  unknown,  not 
only  to  the  general  public,  but  to  the  nobility  of  England, 
and  there  was  but  one  frail  life  between  the  Duke  of  Cum- 
berland and  the  English  throne.  As  for  the  Duke  (now 
Ernest,  King  of  Hanover),  he  went  off  shortly  after  to  his 
new  dominions,  and  public  opinion  in  England  most  read- 
ily acquiesced  in  the  loss  of  both  the  King  and  his  Hano- 
verian kingdom. 

King  Ernest's  first  act  on  reaching  Hanover  was  to  re- 
voke the  constitution  granted  by  his  predecessor.  He  then 
turned  out  of  their  professorial  chair-s  at  Gottingen  three 
distinguished  men  of  letters,  whom  he  sent  into  exile  for 
their  liberal  opinions.  One  of  these  was  Gervinus,  the 
admirable  Shakespeare  commentator  and  scholar. 

Sir  David  Wilkie  was  employed  to  paint  the  scene  of  the 
Queen's  First  Council.  His  picture  now  hangs  in  the 
great  hall  at  Windsor,  but  he  put  in  the  portraits  of  persons 
who  were  not  there,  while  many  who  were  present  were  left 
out.  l 

1  I  saw  the  Queen  frequently  not  long  after  her  accession.  She 
was  decidedly  pretty  as  a  young  girl,  and  her  heads  on  English  post- 
age stamps  and  English  coins  are  excellent  likenesses.  As  to  her 
reading,  I  had  heard  by  common  report  that  it  was  beautiful,  but  sup- 
posed people  exaggerated  its  merits  because  of  her  position.  When 
I  heard  her  read  I  found  I  was  mistaken.  I  have  heard  Fanny 
Kemble,  and  Charles  Kemble,  and  other  great  readers,  but  I  never 
heard  any  reader  who  equalled  Queen  Victoria.  It  was  like  Rachel's 
acting,  a  revelation  of  the  possibilities  of  a  thing  familiar.  Without 
effort  her  voice  filled  the  House  of  Lords,  clear,  distinct,  yet  giving 
the  effect  of  being  sweet  and  low.  I  saw  her  once  in  the  Royal  Pew 

9 


I3O   ENGLAND   IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

It  has  been  supposed,  and  the  supposition  is  supported 
by  a  letter  the  Queen  has  permitted  to  be  published  from 
herself  to  her  uncle  King  Leopold,  that  her  early  life  had 
not  been  altogether  a  happy  one  ;  but  at  all  events  it  admi- 
rably fitted  her  for  the  station  to  which  she  was  called. 
She  learned  patience,  self-control,  punctuality,  industry,  and 
fidelity  to  every  duty ;  kindness  of  heart,  and  a  strict 
sense  of  propriety,  came  to  her  naturally.  The  dread  felt 
in  England  lest  the  Duchess  of  Kent  should  attempt  to 
govern  in  her  daughter's  stead,  or  even  be  "  a  power  behind 
the  throne,"  proved  entirely  uncalled  for.  The  good  sense 
of  both  mother  and  daughter  kept  the  Duchess  in  the  back- 
ground, and  from  the  moment  when  the  young  Queen,  in 
her  white  wrapper,  with  her  bare  feet  thrust  into  slippers, 
came  forth  from  her  chamber  to  meet  the  Lords  who  an- 
nounced to  her  her  uncle's  death,  she  has  reigned  (so  far 
as  a  constitutional  sovereign  can  reign)  alone.  She  has 
had  no  favorites,  no  advisers  except  members  of  her  cab- 
inet, her  uncle  Leopold  (through  Baron  Stockmar),  and 
her  husband.  She  has  had  no  private  secretary,  and  has 
always  read,  and  commented  on,  all  foreign  despatches. 
From  the  time  of  her  marriage  she  rose  early,  walked  with 
her  husband  about  the  grounds  at  Windsor,  breakfasted, 
had  daily  prayers  afterwards  in  the  Chapel,  and  worked 
steadily  at  her  desk,  or  with  her  ministers,  till  luncheon  time. 
If  a  despatch  was  brought  her  she  retired  with  it  instantly 
to  glance  over  it,  and  to  put  it  aside  herself  till  she  had 
time  to  read  it  attentively.  Sometimes  her  children  played 
round  her  as  she  was  writing,  but  then  it  was  required  of 
them  to  be  quiet  and  "  good." 

To  return  however  to  more  early  days.  The  ministry 
when  the  Queen  came  to  the  throne,  was  a  Whig  ministry, 

(a  gallery  pew)  in  the  Chapel  Royal  at  St.  James'.  She  wore  a  black 
silk  mantle,  and  a  straw  bonnet  trimmed  with  brown  ribbon,  and  pink 
roses  in  her  bonnet  cap,  —  as  was  the  fashion  at  that  period.  My 
father  was  at  her  first  levee.  He  told  us  she  behaved  charmingly,  but 
looked  very  tired  towards  the  last,  and  her  poor  little  hand  was  quite 
red,  several  hundred  gentlemen  having  that  day  kissed  it. 

E.  W.  L. 


THE  ACCESSION  OF  QUEEN  VICTORIA.          131 

and  at  its  head  as  Prime  Minister  was  Lord  Melbourne. 
A  few  years  before,  in  anticipation  of  the  possibility  that 
he  might  be  called  to  be  the  adviser  of  a  girl-queen,  his 
enemies  made  an  effort  to  ruin  him. 

Sheridan  had  had  three  lovely  granddaughters ;  one  be- 
came Lady  Eglintoun  (we  all  remember  the  Eglintoun  Tour- 
nament) ;  one  married  the  Hon.  Capt.  Blackwood,  R.  N., 
and  became  Lady  Dufferin ;  and  one  became  the  wife  of  a 
city  magistrate,  Mr.  Norton.  All  these  ladies  were  as  clever 
and  accomplished  as  they  were  beautiful,  but  Mrs.  Norton 
is  best  known  to  the  present  generation  as  the  poetess  Caro- 
line Norton.  She  wrote  the  well  known  little  poem  "The 
Arab's  Farewell  to  his  Horse,"  and  in  later  life  was  the 
author  of  one  of  the  loveliest  of  our  modern  poems,  "The 
Lady  of  Garraye."  Those  who  have  read  "The  Lady  of 
Garraye"  will  not  easily  be  induced  to  believe  harm  of  Mrs. 
Norton.  But  her  husband  was  a  proud,  hard,  cruel  man, 
and  a  violent  Tory.  Her  relations  with  him  were  unhappy, 
and  she  seems  unwisely  to  have  sought  counsel  from  Lord 
Melbourne  as  one  of  her  father's  former  friends.  Mr. 
Norton  became  jealous ;  and  the  opportunity  for  incapaci- 
tating Lord  Melbourne  for  serving  a  young  unmarried 
queen,  was  too  tempting  to  be  lost  by  his  party.  A  scan- 
dal was  raised,  and  a  suit  was  brought  which  resulted  in  the 
entire  acquittal  of  Lord  Melbourne  and  Mrs.  Norton.  The 
jury  gave  their  verdict  without  hearing  the  witnesses  for  the 
defence,  or  leaving  their  box  ;  but  the  affair  left  the  unhappy 
woman  forlorn,  and  deprived  of  the  society  of  her  children 
for  many  years.  Before  Mrs.  Norton's  death,  when  she 
was  seventy  years  old  and  unable  to  rise  from  her  chair, 
she  married  Sir  Stirling  Maxwell,  who  wished  the  world  to 
receive  this  additional  proof  that  he  believed  her  married 
life  with  Mr.  Norton  had  been  free  from  blame. 

Lord  Melbourne's  father  and  mother  had  been  in  their 
day  noted  members  of  society,  —  that  society  of  Fox  and 
Sheridan,  which  gamed  high,  drank  deep,  was  as  witty  as  it 
was  dare-devil,  and  as  brilliant  in  intellect  as  it  was  reckless 
in  expenditure. 


132    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

He  was  his  father's  second  son,  and  is  known  to  us  in 
early  life  as  the  Hon.  William  Lamb.  His  habits  were  in- 
dolent, and  his  studies  somewhat  desultory,  but  his  mind 
was  clear  and  brilliant,  and  one  of  his  college  essays  was 
quoted  in  Parliament  by  the  great  Charles  Fox,  with  much 
appreciation.  He  was,  of  course,  a  Whig,  and  an  admirer 
of  the  French  Revolution  before  it  grew  lurid  under  the 
Reign  of  Terror.  He  adopted  law  as  his  profession,  and 
got  one  brief.  He  used  to  say  that  the  first  sight  of  his 
name  on  the  back  of  that  brief  gave  him  the  highest  feeling 
of  exultation  he  had  ever  enjoyed,  —  far  greater  than  that  of 
seeing  himself  Prime  Minister. 

Unhappily,  his  marriage  for  years  blighted  his  life.  In 
the  silken  covered  books  of  Byron's  Beauties,  common  in 
my  young  days,  we  could  see  an  espiegle  face  crowned  with 
short  curls,  and  labelled  Lady  Caroline  Lamb.  The  poor 
woman  was  clearly  insane,  —  that  sort  of  incomplete  insanity 
so  difficult  to  deal  with ;  so  terrible  to  those  who  are  respon- 
sible for  the  patient's  control.  She  had  fancy  and  feeling ; 
she  was  charming,  even  in  her  moments  of  caprice  ;  provok- 
ing, irritating,  exasperating  ;  but  she  could  recover  at  will  her 
power  over  almost  any  man  who  had  ever  come  under  the  / 
influence  of  her  fascinations.  A  writer  in  the  "  Quarterly 
Review  "  has  quoted,  in  connection  with  her,  Pope's  lines : 

"  Strange  graces  still,  and  stranger  flights  she  had ; 
Was  just  not  ugly,  and  was  just  not  mad  : 
Yet  ne'er  so  sure  our  passion  to  create 
As  when  she  touched  the  brink  of  all  we  hate." 

After  carrying  on  every  manner  of  vagary,  it  pleased  the 
unhappy  woman  to  fall  in  love  with  Lord  Byron  ;  to  attempt 
suicide  in  a  ball-room  with  a  fancy  dagger,  when  she  found 
he  was  getting  tired  of  her  homage ;  and  lastly,  when  they 
parted  (on  the  eve  of  his  marriage  with  Miss  Milbanke,  her 
own  cousin),  she  wrote  a  novel  at  him,  called  "  Glenarvon." 

No  husband  was  ever  more  deserving  of  a  wife's  high 
opinion  than  William  Lamb,  of  whom  Lady  Caroline  herself 
said  suddenly  to  a  gentleman,  at  a  large  dinner-party  shortly 
before  the  publication  of  "  Glenarvon,"  that  he  was  the 


LORD    MELBOURNE 


LORD  MELBOURNE.  133 

most   distinguished    man  she  ever  knew  in  mind,  person, 
refinement,  cultivation,  sensibility,  and  thought. 

Once  or  twice  the  unhappy  pair  were  separated,  but  pity 
for  her  waywardness  always  won  the  husband  back  again. 
They  had  had  three  children ;  two  died  early,  but  one  lived 
to  be  a  hopeless  idiot,  the  object  of  his  father's  tenderest 
love  and  care.  During  the  years  that  Lord  Melbourne's  life 
may  be  said  to  have  been  spent  in  watching  over  this  poor 
boy,  and  shielding  his  unhappy  mother  from  the  conse- 
quences of  her  own  irrational  outbreaks,  he  amused  himself 
with  reading,  —  Greek,  Latin,  history,  literature,  and  the  old 
dramatists ;  and  of  everything  he  read  he  made  himself 
master,  down  to  its  meanest  details.  He  wanted  to  know, 
not  to  display  his  knowledge.  Sydney  Smith  said  of  him  in 
after  years  :  — 

"  Our  Viscount  is  somewhat  of  an  impostor.  Instead  of  being 
the  ignorant  man  he  pretends  to  be,  before  he  meets  a  deputa- 
tion of  tallow-chandlers  in  the  morning  he  sits  up  half  the  night 
talking  with  his  secretary,  Tom  Young,  about  melting  and  skim- 
ming, and  then,  although  he  has  acquired  knowledge  enough  to 
work  off  a  whole  vat  of  prime  Leicestershire  tallow,  he  pretends 
the  next  morning  not  to  know  the  difference  between  a  dip  candle 
and  a  mould.  I  moreover  believe  him  to  be  conscientiously  alive 
to  the  good  or  evil  he  is  doing,  and  that  his  caution  has  more  than 
once  arrested  gigantic  and  unreasonable  projects  in  the  Lower 
House.  I  am  sorry  to  hurt  any  man's  feelings,  or  to  brush  away 
the  magnificent  fabric  of  levity  and  gaiety  that  Lord  Melbourne 
has  raised,  behind  which  to  hide  himself,  but  I  accuse  our  min- 
ister of  honesty  and  diligence." 

One  of  Lord  Melbourne's  most  striking  peculiarities  was 
a  fault  acquired  in  the  society  in  which  his  lot  was  cast  in 
early  manhood,  —  a  habit  of  accompanying  every  sentence 
of  his  speech  with  a  "  big,  big  D."  On  one  occasion  Sydney 
Smith  said  to  him,  "  Now,  suppose  we  consider  everything 
and  everybody  duly  d — d,  and  go  on  to  the  subject."  How 
Lord  Melbourne  managed  to  keep  this  fault  in  check  while 
political  preceptor  to  his  young  Queen,  it  is  difficult  to 
imagine. 


134    ENGLAND  IN  THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

His  wife,  poor  Lady  Caroline,  died  in  1828  in  her  hus- 
band's arms.  A  year  or  two  before  her  death  she  wrote  thus 
to  William  Godwin  :  — 

"  There  is  nothing  marked,  sentimental,  or  interesting  in  my 
career.  All  I  know  is,  that  I  was  happy,  well,  rich,  joyful,  and 
surrounded  by  friends.  I  have  now  only  one  faithful,  kind  friend 
in  William  Lamb,  two  others  in  my  father  and  mother ;  but 
health,  spirits,  and  all  else  is  gone.  How  ?  Oh,  surely  not 
bv  the  visitation  of  God,  but  slowly  and  gradually  by  my  own 
fault." 

William  Lamb  had  never  been  in  public  office,  but  he  had 
been  a  member  of  Parliament,  and  (like  Lord  Althorp  in 
his  early  career)  had  been  an  habitually  careless  and  inat- 
tentive one.  Mr.  Canning  recommended  him  to  George  IV. 
as  Secretary  for  Ireland,  under  Lord  Wellesley.  The  King, 
who  liked  his  manners,  consented  at  once.  "  Oh,  Lamb  ! 
—  yes,  Lamb!  Put  him  anywhere."  But  the  public  were 
astonished  that  a  man  only  known  to  them  as  a  wit,  a  bon 
vivant,  and  a  dilletante  should  be  sent  to  such  a  post.  He 
proved  admirable  in  it,  however,  —  indefatigable  in  work, 
and  most  conciliatory  in  manners.  When  the  Duke  of  Wel- 
lington succeeded  Canning  he  wanted  Lamb  to  remain  in 
Ireland,  but  he  preferred  to  come  home,  and  to  see  how 
politics  then  stood  in  England.  Desponding  letters  from 
his  wife  also  recalled  him.  He  found  her  dying.  After  her 
death  her  brother  warmly  expressed  his  sense  of  the  solace 
which  her  husband's  frequent  letters  had  afforded  her,  and 
his  tenderness  of  demeanor  towards  her  when  he  came. 

He  accepted  office  and  held  it  till  the  resignation  of  Mr. 
Huskisson,  soon  after  which,  by  his  father's  death,  he  became 
Viscount  Melbourne ;  but  he  was  worse  than  childless,  and 
any  further  promotion  in  the  Peerage  he  steadily  in  after 
years  declined.  Honors  to  be  transmitted  to  posterity  had 
no  pleasure  in  them  for  him.  In  1834,  after  Lord  Grey's 
ministry  went  out  of  office,  Lord  Melbourne  was  made  Prime 
Minister.  His  premiership  was  interrupted  for  a  brief  space 
in  1835,  while  King  William  tried  to  form  a  Tory  ministry. 
He  had  to  manage  at  once  an  unruly  and  capricious,  though 


LORD  MELBOURNE.  135 

well-meaning,  •  king,  a  weak  and  disunited  cabinet,  and  a 
factious  and  disorderly  House  of  Commons,  in  which  Lord 
Brougham,  disappointed  at  not  having  been  made  Chancel- 
lor, and  O'Connell,  disappointed  that  he  had  not  a  high  law 
appointment  in  Ireland,  joined  the  Tories  in  opposition. 
Brougham  was  not  Chancellor  because  William  IV.  bitterly 
disliked  him,  and  is  said  to  have  exclaimed,  on  parting  with 
him,  that  "  he  did  n't  want  ever  to  see  his  ugly  face  again  ;  " 
besides  which  his  late  colleagues  objected  to  him  in  the 
cabinet.  "  Brougham,"  they  said,  "is  dangerous  as  an 
enemy,  but  destructive  as  a  friend." 

Things  were  in  this  state,  and  the  ministry  very  weak  in 
the  House  of  Commons,  when  King  William  died. 

The  question  that  arose  in  all  men's  minds  at  once  was  : 
Was  Lord  Melbourne  a  fit  man  to  be  the  first  adviser  and 
"  political  preceptor  "  of  a  young  and  maiden  Queen?  His 
nephew,  Lord  Cowper,  writing  a  sketch  of  his  uncle's  life 
in  the  "Ninteenth  Century  "  magazine,  says,  — 

"  It  is  important  to  remember  always  that  the  charm  of  Lord 
Melbourne's  manner  was  the  one  great  thing  that  remained 
impressed  upon  the  mind  of  all  those  who  had  communication 
with  him.  Sparkling  originality,  keen  insight  into  character,  a 
rich  store  of  information  on  every  subject  always  at  hand  to 
strengthen  and  illustrate  conversation,  exuberant  vitality,  and 
above  all,  the  most  transparent  simplicity  of  nature,  —  these, 
from  what  I  have  heard,  must  have  been  his  principal  charac- 
teristics. I  am'  bound  to  add  that  some  of  his  fashions  in 
speech  often  shocked  fastidious  people.  .  .  .  The  charms  of 
his  manner  and  conversation  were  set  forth  to  the  utmost 
advantage  by  a  beautiful  voice  and  a  prepossessing  personal 
appearance.  He  was  tall,  strong,  and  of  vigorous  constitution; 
brilliantly  handsome  even  in  old  age." 

Such  is  the  description  of  Lord  Melbourne  by  his  kins- 
man. Here  is  another  sketch  of  him  by  a  writer  in  the 
"  Quarterly,"  a  review  devoted  to  the  interests  of  his 
political  enemies  :  — • 

"  Lord  Melbourne  had  merit  enough  to  throw  any  co-existin^ 
demerit  into  the  shade ;  merit  enough  to  give  him  prominent 


136    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

rank  as  a  high-bred,  high-minded,  and  highly  cultivated,  thor- 
oughly English  statesman,  of  whom  the  contemporary  and 
every  succeeding  generation  of  Englishmen  may  be  proud." 

Greville  says, — 

"  The  Queen  is  upon  terms  of  the  greatest  cordiality  with 
Lord  Melbourne,  and  very  naturally.  Everything  is  new  and 
delightful  to  her.  She  is  surrounded  with  the  most  exciting 
and  interesting  enjoyments ;  her  occupations,  her  business,  her 
Court,  all  present  an  unceasing  round  of  gratifications.  With 
all  her  prudence  and  discretion  she  has  great  animal  spirits,  and 
enters  into  the  magnificent  novelties  of  her  position  with  the 
zest  and  curiosity  of  a  child.  No  man  is  more  formed  to 
ingratiate  himself  with  her  than  Melbourne.  He  treats  her 
with  unbounded  consideration  and  respect,  he  consults  her 
taste  and  her  wishes,  and  he  puts  her  at  her  ease  by  his  frank 
and  natural  manners,  while  he  amuses  her  by  the  quaint,  queer, 
and  epigrammatic  turn  of  his  mind,  and  his  varied  knowledge 
upon  all  subjects.  It  is  not  therefore  surprising  that  she  should 
be  well  content  with  her  present  government.  .  .  .  She  seems 
to  be  liberal,  but  at  the  same  time  prudent  with  regard  to 
money,  for  when  the  Queen  Dowager  proposed  to  her  to  take 
her  band  into  her  service,  she  declined  to  incur  so  great  an 
expense  without  consideration  ;  but  one  of  the  first  things  she 
spoke  to  Melbourne  about  was  the  payment  of  her  father's 
debts,  which  she  is  resolved  to  discharge." 

"  If,"  says  the  article  in  the  Quarterly  already  quoted.  "  it  be, 
as  is  universally  agreed,  that  no  monarch,  male  or  female,  ever 
better  understood,  or  more  conscientiously  fulfilled  the  highest 
duties  of  a  constitutional  sovereign  than  Queen  Victoria,  all 
honor  to  the  sagacious,  high-minded  counsellor  who  watched 
over  her  with  parental  care  whilst  those  duties  were  new 
to  her,  and  devoted  his  best  energies  to  guide  and  confirm 
the  inborn  rectitude  of  purpose  and  elevation  of  character  by 
which  the  prosperity  of  a  great  empire,  and  the  well-being  of 
millions  have  been  nobly  upheld.  It  would  be  difficult  to  name 
a  more  impressive  scene  than  that  of  the  elderly  statesman, 
reading,  as  he  did,  to  the  young  and  inexperienced  sovereign 
the  verses  in  which  Solomon,  asked  by  God  in  a  dream  what  he 
wished  to  be  given  him,  replied :  '  An  understanding  heart  to 
judge  this  people.' " 

On  its  being  maliciously  remarked  to  the  Duke  of  Wel- 
lington, the  Tory  leader,  that  "  Lord  Melbourne  was  a  great 


LORD  MELBOURNE.  137 

deal  at  the  palace,"  the  Duke  sharply  said,  "I  wish  to 
heaven  he  was  always  there  ;  "  and  three  years  later  he 
spoke  thus  hi  the  House  of  Lords :  — 

"  I  am  willing  to  admit  that  the  noble  Viscount  has  rendered 
the  greatest  possible  service  to  Her  Majesty  ;  .  .  .  making 
her  acquainted  with  the  mode  and  policy  of  the  government  of 
this  country,  initiating  her  into  the  laws  and  spirit  of  the  Con- 
stitution, independently  of  the  performance  of  his  duty  as  the 
servant  of  Her  Majesty  ;  teaching  her,  in  short,  to  preside  over 
the  destinies  of  this  great  country." 

But  of  course  caricaturists  and  others  took  hold  of 
the  subject  and  mad.e  pictures  and  squibs  concerning  the 
Prime  Minister's  constant  attendance  on  the  young  Queen. 
This  was  her  first  initiation  into  the  discomforts  attend- 
ant on  her  exalted  station.  "  H.  B."  was  more  decorous 
than  Gilray,  the  caricaturist  of  the  times  of  George  III., 
and  the  Prince  Regent,  but  "  H.  B."  allowed  himself  a 
license  which  "  Punch  "  does  not  permit  himself  now. 

The  first  great  subject  of  public  interest  in  the  days  of 
Queen  Victoria  was  the  revolt  in  Canada.  Canada  has 
been  so  long  a  loyal  part  of  the  Queen's  dominions  that 
it  seems  hardly  worth  while  to  dwell  on  its  old  grievances ; 
but,  in  brief,  the  French  (or  Lower  Canadians)  deemed 
themselves  neglected,  and  under  a  leader  named  Papineau, 
a  member  of  the  Provincial  Parliament,  bought  arms  on  the 
United  States  side  of  the  St.  Lawrence,  and  broke  into  in- 
surrection. It  was  put  down,  though  with  some  difficulty,  by 
General  Hill  and  Lord  Durham,  son-in-law  to  Lord  Grey,  who 
had  been  a  prominent  Whig  leader  during  the  passage  of  the 
Reform  Bill.  As  Lord  Durham  had  been  then  stigmatized 
as  a  violent  Radical,  it  is  amusing  to  find  that  when  placed 
in  a  position  of  authority  he  displayed  as  strong  a  partiality 
for  despotic  rale  as  General  Jackson.  Having  got  Papineau 
and  some  others  into  his  hands,  he  proposed  to  exile  them 
to  Bermuda  without  process  of  law,  and  to  put  them  to 
death  if  they  returned  to  Canada.  He  was  recalled  after 
this  "  ordinance,"  and  came  home  very  angry ;  but  the 
ministry  was  too  weak  to  bear  many  shocks,  and  in  1839, 


138    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

being  defeated  on  some  West  _  Indian  measure,  it  resigned. 
The  Duke  of  Wellington,  though  of  the  opposite  party,  had 
deprecated  all  factious  opposition  on  the  part  of  the  Con- 
servatives, believing  it  best  to  leave  the  young  Queen  the 
minister  who  seemed  so  wisely  guiding  her.  However, 
when  Lord  Melbourne  had  to  resign  for  want  of  a  majority 
in  the  House  of  Commons,  the  Queen  sent  for  the  Duke, 
who  advised  her  to  summon  Sir  Robert  Peel.  Before,  how- 
ever, Peel  could  form  a  ministry,  a  difficulty  arose.  The 
Queen  insisted  that  the  resignation  of  the  Whig  Ministry 
could  not  involve  the  dismissal  of  all  the  ladies  of  her 
household.  Sir  Robert  replied  that  almost  all  her  ladies 
were  near  kinswomen  of  leading  Whig  noblemen,  and  that 
he  could  not  undertake  to  form  a  government  if  their  influ- 
ence was  to  be  paramount  at  court. 

This  led  to  what  was  called  the  Bed  Chamber  Question, 
which  made  more  excitement  among  all  parties  than  can 
now  be  conceived  of.  It  seemed  to  unfold  a  new  view  of 
the  Queen's  character,  —  a  self-will,  people  said,  which 
argued  she  was  granddaughter  of  George  III.  There  were 
also  some  constitutional  questions  involved.  Was  the  pri- 
vate will,  or  the  personal  feelings  of  the  sovereign,  to  put 
a  brake  on  the  affairs  of  the  country  when  Parliament  had 
declared  itself  in  favor  of  a  change  of  administration  ?  Also 
the  Queen's  personal  attachment  to  the  Whigs  and  Lord 
Melbourne,  and  her  personal  dislike  to  Sir  Robert  Peel  and 
the  Tories,  was  made  so  evident,  that  it  seemed  doubtful 
whether  she  would  ever  be  able  to  work  harmoniously  with 
the  Conservative  party.  The  Tories,  too,  were  very  awk- 
wardly placed.  They  had  always  posed  as  the  most  loyal 
subjects  of  the  Crown,  and  now  they  seemed  to  be  oppos- 
ing the  personal  wishes  of  the  Queen  and  attempting  to 
coerce  Her  Majesty. 

The  matter  ended  by  Lord  Melbourne  and  the  Whigs 
coming  back  into  office,  and  holding  it  for  two  more  years ; 
thanks  to  the  intermittent  support  of  O'Connell  and  the 
Radicals,  and  the  patriotism  and  forbearance  of  the  Duke  of 
Wellington.  When  at  the  end  of  that  time  the  Duke  and 
Sir  Robert  Peel  came  into  power  a  compromise  was  effected, 


LADY  CAROLINE   LAMB. 


LORD  MELBOURNE.  139 

and  a  rule  established  that  when  a  new  ministry  came  into 
office,  all  ladies  of  the  royal  household,  nearly  related  to  the 
outgoing  ministers,  should  resign,  and  all  others  be  retained. 

This  rule  commended  itself  to  Lord  Melbourne's  judg- 
ment at  the  time,  though  in  his  later  life  he  was  by  no 
means  confident  that  in  this  Bed  Chamber  matter  he  had 
rightly  advised  the  Queen.  That,  and  an  unfortunate 
occurrence  about  this  time  at  court  (a  scandal  cruelly 
affecting  the  pure  and  virtuous  Lady  Flora  Hastings),  in 
which  the  inexperienced  young  Queen,  while  trying  to  do 
right,  made  herself  the  instrument  of  a  great  wrong,  injured 
for  a  short  time  her  popularity. 

However,  the  Bed  Chamber  affair  did  not  take  place  till 
May,  1839, —  but  on  the  28th  of  June,  1838,  the  young 
Queen  had  been  crowned. 

The  object  of  ministers  was  to  make  the  outside  show  at 
the  coronation  as  imposing  as  possible,  so  as  to  give  enjoy- 
ment to  hundreds  of  thousands  of  people  who  could  not 
possibly  get  into  the  Abbey.  My  father  had  a  ticket  for  the 
Abbey ;  my  mother,  sister,  and  myself  were  invited  by  some 
Boston  friends  then  staying  at  the  St.  James'  Hotel  (one  of 
the  best  points  for  viewing  the  procession)  to  see  it  from 
their  windows. 

The  morning  of  the  Coronation  Day,  June  28,  1838, 
broke  out  gloriously.  "  Queen's  weather  "  has  long  passed 
into  an  English  proverb.1  It  was  very  early  morning  when 

1  May  I  be  pardoned  for  relating  here  a  little  adventure  which  hap- 
pened to  me  in  Westminster  Abbey  while  preparations  for  the  coro- 
nation were  going  on  ?  The  public  is  in  general  not  allowed  to  wander 
at  will  among  the  tombs  and  statues,  but  custodians  that  day  could  not 
be  spared.  I  was  with  a  party  who  had  tickets  to  view  the  prepara- 
tions. Taking  advantage  of  our  liberty,  we  went  up  on  the  roof  and 
looked  down  upon  London.  Coming  down  we  descended  a  very  nar- 
row winding  stone  staircase.  Half  way  down  I  saw  a  door  fastened 
only  by  a  button.  Prompted  by  the  curiosity  of  "  sweet  sixteen,"  I 
opened  it,  and  found  myself  face  to  face,  as  it  seemed  to  me,  with  the 
corpse  of  Queen  Elizabeth.  There  she  was,  ruff,  and  red  hair,  white 
satin  petticoat,  and  enormously  long  stomacher.  In  my  fright  I  had 
nearly  fallen  headlong  down  the  stairs.  It  was  a  wax  figure,  which 
for  two  centuries  had  been  shown  in  the  Abbey,  and  finally,  being 
judged  an  unseemly  exhibition,  had  been  thrust  into  this  closet  on, 
the  winding  stair,  where  I  dare  say  it  remains  unto  this  day. 


140    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

we  drove  as  near  as  we  were  able  to  the  line  of  the  proces- 
sion, and  then  made  our  way  by  back  streets  to  the  St.  James' 
Hotel.  For  days  the  excitement  throughout  London  had 
been  great.  An  encampment  had  been  made  in  Hyde 
Park,  which  was  full  of  soldiers,  and  all  along  the  line  of  the 
procession  (about  two  miles)  scaffoldings  had  been  erected, 
and  seats  let  by  the  householders.  It  was  said  afterwards 
that  ^200,000  (that  is,  a  million  of  dollars)  had  been  paid 
for  seats  alone,  and  the  number  of  strangers  that  flocked 
into  London  for  the  occasion  was  about  500,000.  The 
pavements  were  of  course  entirely  filled  with  spectators; 
the  line  of  march  had,  during  the  night,  been  covered  with 
fresh  gravel.  Police  patrolled  the  line,  and  at  intervals 
of  about  twenty  feet  apart,  horse  soldiers  guarded  it  in 
all  their  martial  pomp  and  bravery.  No  person  whatever 
was  allowed  to  pick  his  way  along  the  line  of  march,  unless 
he  was  in  court  dress  or  uniform,  and  had  a  ticket  for  the 
Abbey.  It  was  amusing  to  see  some  of  these  unfortunates, 
at  what  to  them  must  have  seemed  the  dawn  of  day,  picking 
their  way  cautiously  over  the  loose  gravel,  in  full  court  cos- 
tume,—  white  silk  stockings,  buckles,  laced  cocked  hats, 
white  knee-breeches,  waistcoats  with  flaps,  and  powdered 
wigs. 

There  were  splendid  companies  of  troops  and  bands, 
and  high  dignitaries,  —  archbishops,  bishops,  and  judges ; 
but  the  great  sight  was  the  carriages  of  the  ambassadors. 
It  had  been  required  of  them  that  they  should  make  a 
beautiful  display.  The  ambassadors  of  the  Great  Powers 
had  each  several  carriages  drawn  by  the  most  beautiful 
horses  (always  four) .  But  the  enthusiasm  of  the  day,  until 
the  Queen  drew  near,  was  for  Marshal  Soult.  He  had  been 
sent  as  Ambassador  Extraordinary  by  Louis  Philippe  for  the 
occasion.  Of  the  interest  he  excited  everywhere  in  London 
Charles  Greville  says,  — 

"  The  old  soldier  is  touched  to  the  quick  by  this  generous 
reception,  and  has  given  utterance  to  his  gratitude  and  sen- 
sibility on  several  occasions  in  very  apt  terms." 

It  need  not  be  said  that  the  Duke  of  Wellington  was 
foremost  in  his  attentions  to  his  old  antagonist.  His  car- 


LORD   MELBOURNE.  141 

riages  and  horses  made  a  wonderful  display.  Prince  Ester- 
hazy,  the  Austrian  ambassador,  was  also  magnificent.  He 
himself  blazed  with  diamonds  from  his  hat  to  his  heels ; 
and,  as  most  of  these  state  carriages  had  glass  panels,  we 
could  see  the  celebrities  inside  very  plainly.  The  American 
Ambassador  at  that  time  was  Mr.  Stevenson,  of  Virginia. 
His  carriage  was  of  republican  simplicity,  but  with  magnifi- 
cent horses,  and  well-dressed  servants,  in  very  plain  livery. 
Both  servants  and  horses  had  been  brought  from  his  own 
plantation.  The  good  taste  of  his  equipages  was  appre- 
ciated by  the  crowd.  Finally  the  Queen  came  in  the  State 
Gilded  Coach,  drawn  by  the  eight  long-tailed,  cream- 
colored,  heavy  Hanoverian  horses.  One  of  these  animals 
electrified  the  London  public  a  few  years  since  by  some 
capers  of  which  its  race  had  never  been  supposed  capable. 
Each  horse  was  led  by  a  groom  in  the  red  royal  livery. 
The  Queen's  carriage  was  preceded  by  the  beef-eaters 
(buffetiers,  —  men  who  stand  by  the  buffet  to  guard  the 
sovereign  when  at  dinner).  They  wore  the  costume  of 
Henry  VIII. 's  day,  —  heavy  leggings,  a  very  full  and  very 
short  kilt,  with  a  flat  cap  and  an  embroidered  jerkin. 
Their  particular  office  now-a-days,  unless  on  State  occa- 
sions, is  to  guard  the  Tower. 

The  Queen  wore  some  of  her  State  robes,  and  looked 
very  sweet  and  womanly.  In  the  carriage  with  her  was  the 
Duchess  of  Sutherland,  probably  the  most  beautiful  woman 
in  England.  On  State  occasions  the  Duchess  of  Kent,  the 
Queen's  mother,  seemed  always  to  efface  herself. 

My  father  saw  the  ceremonies  in  the  interior  of  the  Abbey. 
But  what  he  saw  I  may  better  describe  in  the  words  of  an 
old  lady  who  published  her  reminiscences  of  that  day,  a  few 
years  since,  in  the  "  Monthly  Packet,"  a  delightful  English 
periodical,  edited  by  Miss  Charlotte  Yonge.  She  says  :  — 

"  When  the  Queen  rose  from  her  knees  on  first  entering  the 
Abbey  in  her  robes  of  State,  the  Archbishop  turned  her  round 
to  each  of  the  four  sides  of  the  Abbey,  saying,  in  a  voice  so 
clear  it  was  heard  in  the  inmost  recesses,  '  Sirs,  I  here  present 
unto  you  the  undoubted  Queen  of  this  realm.  Will  ye  all 


142    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

swear  to  do  her  homage  ? '  And  each  time  as  he  said  it  there 
were  shouts  of,  '  Long  live  Queen  Victoria !  '  and  the  sounding 
of  trumpets  and  the  waving  of  flags,  which  made  the  poor  little 
Queen  turn  first  very  red,  and  then  so  pale  she  seemed  as  if  she 
longed  to  creep  under  the  Archbishop's  wing.  Most  of  the  ladies 
cried.  It  did  not  affect  me  in  that  way,  but  it  gave  me  what  I 
may  call  a  new  sensation,  and  I  felt  I  should  not  forget  it  as  long 
as  I  lived.  The  Queen  recovered  herself  after  this  and  went 
through  all  the  ceremony  as  if  she  had  often  been  crowned 
before;  but  seemed  very  much  impressed,  too,  with  the  service, 
—  and  a  most  beautiful  one  it  is.  The  coronation  struck  me  as 
being  less  of  a  show,  and  so  much  more  of  a  religious  ceremony 
than  I  expected.  The  Archbishop  seemed  to  take  a  more  prom- 
inent part  than  the  Queen  herself.  Certainly  there  was  some- 
thing very  beautiful  in  the  way  he  blessed  her,  both  before  and 
after  he  had  crowned  her  ;  all  the  others  joining  with  a  loud 
'  Amen  ! '  And  she  looked  more  like  a  child  receiving  her  father's 
blessing  than  anything  else,  for  no  one  would  have  taken  her  to  be 
as  much  as  nineteen  years  old.  It  was  a  pleasure  to  think  it  was 
a  really  good  man  who  was  giving  her  that  benediction ;  indeed, 
no  one  who  was  not  could  have  read  the  service  so  touchingly  as 
he  did.  She  once  asked  him  leave  to  sit  down,  and  she  did  it  so 
prettily ;  so  she  did  when,  putting  off  her  crown,  she  received  the 
sacrament.  The  music  was  beautiful.  When  the  Queen  came 
in  the  choir  sang,  '  I  was  glad  when  they  said  unto  me,  Let  us  go 
into  the  House  of  the  Lord.'  While  she  was  being  crowned 
they  sang,  '  Zadok  the  Priest,  and  Nathan  the  Prophet,  anointed 
Solomon  King.'  And  then,  when  it  was  over,  'The  King  shall 
rejoice ! '  and  the  Hallelujah  Chorus. 

"  The  prettiest  part  of  the  sight  was  the  Queen's  eight  train- 
bearers, —  the  eight  handsomest  girls  they  could  find,  I  believe, 
among  the  daughters  of  Dukes,  Marquises,  and  Earls.  They 
were  dressed  alike  in  silver  muslin  gowns,  with  roses  on  their 
heads.  They  held  up  Her  Majesty's  purple  velvet  train,  and 
once  or  twice  they  pulled  her  back  by  it,  for  which  the  Duchesses 
of  Northumberland  and  Sunderland  scolded  them.  When  the 
service  was  over  the  homage  began.  The  Archbishop,  in  the 
Rubric,  is  ordered  to  'lift'  the  Queen  on  the  throne.  He  did 
not  do  that,  but  gave  her  his  arm,  and  walked  her  up  the  steps 
of  the  throne,  and  seated  her  on  it.  Then,  as  if  he  had  made 
her  Queen,  he  left  her,  and  came  to  do  her  homage. 

"  The  only  excitement  was  caused  by  old  Lord  Rolles,  who  is 
past  eighty,  and  insisted  on  paying  his  homage.  He  stumbled 
and  fell.  The  Queen  started  from  her  throne,  and  tried  to  save 


DUKE    OF  KENT. 


LORD  MELBOURNE.  143 

him,  at  which  all  the  Abbey  shouted  and  cheered.  The  Queen 
throughout  behaved  very  prettily,  and  when  she  left  the  Abbey 
bowed  to  Lord  Rolles  and  to  nobody  else.  The  last  prayer 
having  been  said,  the  robe  of  cloth  of  gold  having  been  taken 
off,  and  the  purple  one  put  on,  they  put  her  sceptre  in  one  hand 
and  the  orb  in  the  other ;  the  crown  was  on  her  head,  and  our 
most  Gracious  Sovereign  Lady  left  the  Abbey." 

Miss  Martineau,  who  was  a  keen  though  not  always  a 
sympathetic  observer,  has  left  us  a  graphic  account  of  what 
she  saw  that  day  in  the  Abbey,  which  she  reached  before  six 
o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  found  that  many  ladies,  decolletfos, 
bare-armed,  and  in  full  dress,  had  been  standing  on  the  cold 
flagstones  waiting  for  admittance  since  half-past  five. 

"  The  sight  of  the  rapid  filling  of  the  Abbey,"  she  says,  "was 
enough  to  go  for ;  the  stone  architecture  contrasted  finely  with 
the  gay  colors  of  the  multitude.  Except  a  mere  sprinkling  of 
oddities,  every  one  was  in  full  dress.  The  scarlet  of  the  military 
officers  mixed  in  so  well,  and  the  groups  of. the  clergy  were  dig- 
nified, but  to  an  unaccustomed  eye  the  prevalence  of  court  dress 
had  a  curious  effect.  The  Earl  Marshal  s  assistants,  called  Gold 
Sticks,  looked  well  from  above,  lightly  flitting  about  in  white 
breeches,  silk  stockings,  blue  laced  frock  coats,  and  white  sashes. 
The  throne  *  was  an  arm-chair  with  a  round  back,  and  beneath 
its  seat  was  a  ledge,  on  which  lay  the  Stone  of  Scone.  It  was 
covered,  as  was  its  footstool,  with  cloth  of  gold,  and  it  stood  on 
an  elevation  of  five  steps  in  the  centre  of  the  area.  The  first 
Peeress  took  her  seat  in  the  North  Transept  at  a  quarter  before 
seven,  and  three  of  the  Bishops  came  next.  From  that  time  the 
Peers  and  their  ladies  arrived  faster  and  faster.  ...  I  never 
anywhere  saw  so  remarkable  a  contrast  between  youth  and  age 
as  in  these  noble  ladies,  all  with  their  necks  and  arms  bare,  and 
glittering  with  diamonds.  .  .  .  The  younger  ones  were  as  lovely 
as  the  old  ones  were  haggard. 

"  At  half-past  eleven  we  were  told  that  the  Queen  had  arrived. 
Then  in  the  robing-room  there  was  some  delay.  .  .  .  The  accla- 
mation when  the  crown  was  put  on  the  Queen's  head  was  very 
animating,  and  in  the  midst  of  it,  in  an  instant  of  time,  the  Peer- 
esses were  all  coroneted." 

1  Edward  the  Confessor's. 


144   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

At  that  moment  a  ray  of  sunshine  fell  upon  them  where 
they  sat  in  the  North  Transept,  and  the  flash  of  the  dia- 
monds in  the  sunlight  was  a  thing  never  to  be  forgotten. 

There  was  one  contretemps.  The  coronation  ring  with 
its  great  ruby  had  been  made  for  the  little  finger  of  the 
Queen,  but  the  Archbishop  insisted  it  must  be  put  on  the 
fourth  finger,  as  the  rubric  prescribes.  He  forced  it  on, 
but  it  hurt  her  very  much,  and  as  soon  as  the  ceremony 
was  over  she  had  to  bathe  her  finger  in  iced  water  to  get 
it  off.  She  said  to  Lord  John  Thynne  when  the  orb  was 
put  into  her  hand,  "What  am  I  to  do  with  it?  "  "  Your 
Majesty  is  to  carry  it,  if  you  please,  in  your  hand."  "  Am 
I?  "  she  said  ;  "  it  is  very  heavy." 

Miss  Martineau  repeats  a  story  current  in  London  at  the 
time,  that  a  foreigner  who  was  present,  when  writing  home 
an  account  of  the  coronation,  and  mentioning  Lord  Rolles's 
accident,  gravely  reported  what  he  entirely  believed  on  the 
word  of  a  wag,  that  the  Lords  Rolles  held  their  estates  on 
the  condition  of  performing  the  feat  of  rolling  off  the  steps 
of  the  throne  at  every  coronation. 

At  night  all  London  was  illuminated.  No  carriages  were 
allowed  in  the  streets,  but  the  crowd  so  blocked  them  that 
it  was  difficult  to  move  about.  Greville  says,  — 

"  From  Buckingham  Palace  to  Westminster  Abbey  by  the 
way  that  the  procession  took,  which  must  be  two  or  three  miles 
in  length,  there  was  a  dense  mass  of  people,  the  seats  and 
benches  were  all  full,  every  window  occupied.  The  roofs  of 
the  houses  were  covered  with  spectators,  for  the  most  part  well 
dressed  ;  and  from  the  great  space  through  which  they  were 
distributed  there  was  no  extraordinary  pressure,  and  conse- 
quently no  cause  for  violence  or  ill-humor.  In  the  evening  I 
met  Esterhazy,  and  asked  him  what  the  foreigners  said.  He  re- 
plied, '  They  admired  it  all  very  much.  The  Russians  and  others,' 
he  added,  '  may  not  like  you,  but  they  feel  it,  and  it  makes  a 
great  impression  on  them.  In  fact,  nothing  can  be  seen  like  it 
in  any  other  country.'  " 

"The  great  merit  of  this  coronation,"  adds  Greville,  "is 
that  so  much  has  been  done  for  the  people.  To  amuse  and 
interest  them  seems  to  have  been  the  principal  object." 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE    MARRIAGE   OF    QUEEN    VICTORIA. O'CONNELL   AND 

IRELAND. 

HP  HE  marriage  of  their  young  Queen  was  naturally  a 
*-  subject  of  the  deepest  interest  to  the  English  people. 
In  the  first  place,  on  that  marriage  would  depend  her  future 
happiness,  and  the  general  course  of  politics  during  her 
reign ;  in  the  second  place,  if  the  Queen  remained  unmar- 
ried, or,  if  married,  should  die  childless,  the  hated  Ernest 
of  Hanover  (the  Duke  of  Cumberland)  was  her  heir 
presumptive. 

Of  course  the  world  speculated  as  to  whom  she  would 
marry.  Some  persons  thought  her  choice  would  be  her 
cousin,  Prince  George  of  Cambridge,  but  the  Cambridge 
family  was  not  then  popular  with  the  English  ;  the  old 
Duke  was  so  silly,  and  the  Duchess,  who  had  spent  most 
of  her  married  life  in  Hanover  was  little  known  in  England. 
A  story  was  got  up  that  the  young  Queen  had  appeared  to 
distinguish  Lord  Elphinstone  at  some  of  her  entertainments, 
and  that  on  that  account  he  had  been  sent  off  to  India. 
But  all  this  time  her  sagacious  elders  —  her  mother,  the 
Duchess  of  Kent,  and  her  uncle,  King  Leopold  —  were 
planning  for  her  a  future  that  would  make  her  domestic 
life  the  happiest  of  the  happy  for  one-and-twenty  years. 
A  young  Prince,  three  months  younger  than  herself,  was 
being  educated  to  be  her  husband,  —  trained  by  their  uncle 
Leopold  to  occupy  the  very  place  he  would  have  occupied 
in  English  history  had  Princess  Charlotte  lived.  It  was  no 
easy  position.  It  was  one  requiring  great  self-abnegation, 
self-effacement,  tact,  judgment,  even  wisdom ;  and  almost 

10 


146    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

from  his  birth  this  young  Prince  had  been  in  training  for 
the  fate  designed  for  him.  On  what  his  character  might 
prove  to  be,  it  might  be  said  that  the  fate  of  the  world  for 
two  generations  would  depend. 

It  was  in  November,  1839,  tna^  *ne  Queen  announced  to 
her  ministers  her  intention  of  marrying  her  cousin,  Prince 
Albert  of  Saxe-Coburg-Gotha,  and  the  next  day  she  appeared 
at  dinner  wearing  his  portrait  set  in  diamonds. 

The  news  was  a  surprise  to  many  of  her  ministers.  The 
matter  had  been  treated  wholly  as  a  domestic  affair.  The 
Prince  had  been  visiting  at  Windsor,  but  of  what  was  going 
on  between  the  young  people  even  Lord  Melbourne  had 
not  been  officially  informed. 

The  marriage  was  not  altogether  agreeable  to  the  nation. 
Some  persons  objected  to  the  union  of  first  cousins.  Among 
the  populace  rose  the  ready  cry  of  "  beggarly  Germans." 
But  the  great  outcry  was  when  the  intended  marriage  was 
announced  in  Parliament. 

There  were  two  branches  of  the  House  of  Coburg,  one 
Catholic,  one  Protestant.  It  was  said  they  were  kept  thus 
to  afford  husbands  either  for  Catholic  or  Protestant  queens. 
Lord  Melbourne,  in  announcing  the  marriage  to  Parliament, 
had  omitted  to  state  distinctly  that  Prince  Albert  was  a 
Protestant,  and  this  was  interpreted  to  mean  that  he  was 
a  Jesuit  in  disguise.  "  If  he  is  not  a  Catholic,"  wrote  King 
Ernest  of  Hanover,  "  he  is  a  free-thinker  and  atheist,  which 
is  even  worse." 

A  howl  of  protest  rose  throughout  all  England.  Minis- 
ters said  that  howl  was  pure  nonsense  and  fanaticism,  and 
refused  to  make  any  change  in  their  announcement  to  the 
public,  though  they  stated  distinctly  in  their  speeches  in 
Parliament  that  Prince  Albert  was  a  good  Protestant. 
These  speeches,  however,  did  not  satisfy  the  public ;  there 
seemed  to  be  some  mystery  about  the  Prince's  religion, 
—  something  withheld.  Even  his  name  did  not  please  the 
people,  —  Albert!  so  un-English!  it  was  said.  We  who 
knew  all  about  Prince  Albert's  position  with  regard  to  re- 
ligion, may  smile  now  at  the  idea  of  his  being  considered 


DUCHESS   OF  KENT. 


THE  MARRIAGE   OF  QUEEN  VICTORIA.         147 

an  atheist,  or  disposed  to  adopt  Catholicism.  However,  a 
great  deal  of  ferment  was  created  in  the  minds  of  the 
public,  which  probably  led  to  successful  resistance  in  Par- 
liament to  the  allowance  proposed  for  him  by  ministers ; 
that  is,  ^50,000,  the  same  sum  voted  for  Prince  Leopold 
when  he  married  Princess  Charlotte.  Mr.  Hume,  the 
economist  of  the  House  of  Commons,  proposed  instead 
^21,000.  It  was  finally  made  ,£30,000,  very  much  to  the 
distress  of  the  Queen. 

This  is  pretty  much  all  that  we  should  know  of  the 
engagement,  were  it  not  for  the  Life  of  the  Prince  Con- 
sort, virtually  written  by  the  Queen  herself;  and  if  occa- 
sionally it  seems  strange  to  us  that  we  should  be  admitted 
in  her  lifetime  to  her  womanly  confidences,  we  must  remem- 
ber the  position  in  which  a  queen  stands.  She  has  no 
social  equal.  If  she  would  give  confidence,  she  must  pour 
it  directly,  or  indirectly,  into  the  public  ear.  She  has  lived 
always  with  a  glare  of  light  thrown  on  her  path  and  on  her 
bed ;  to  the  great  heart  of  England,  rather  than  to  cour- 
tiers, Queen  Victoria  turned  with  an  appeal  for  sympathy 
when  her  great  sorrow  came ;  and,  as  Sir  Charles  Grey 
says  in  his  preface  to  her  Reminiscences  of  Prince  Albert's 
early  life,  of  their  engagement,  and  their  marriage,  "  No 
one  could  doubt  this  confidence  would  meet  with  the  warm- 
est and  most  heartfelt  sympathy."  This  being  the  case, 
we  turn  to  the  Queen's  pages,  and  learn  much  there  that 
she  could  tell  us,  and  she  alone. 

Prince  Albert,  or  as  they  baptized  him,  Francis  Albert 
Augustus  Charles  Emmanuel,  was  born  on  August  26,  1819, 
three  months  after  the  "  May-flower,"  his  little  English 
cousin.  He  was  of  the  old  Saxony  house  of  Coburg ;  his 
father  was  its  Grand  Duke,  and  his  mother,  Louise,  was-  the 
last  representative  of  the  House  of  Gotha.  She  was  not  a 
lady  of  spotless  reputation,  and  four  years  after  the  birth 
of  her  second  son,  Prince  Albert,  she  was  divorced  by  her 
husband.  She  lived  in  retirement  nine  years  in  Switzer- 
land, not  permitted  to  hold  any  intercourse  with  her  chil- 
dren. The  Queen  tells  us  she  was  full  of  talent  and 
cleverness,  small,  and  very  beautiful,  with  blue  eyes ;  and 


148    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Prince  Albert,  who  tenderly  cherished  all  early  memories  of 
her,  was  thought  extremely  like  her. 

Prince  Ernest,  Prince  Albert's  brother,  was  a  stout, 
hearty,  active  lad,  with  bright  black  eyes.  Albert  was  fair, 
with  blue  eyes  and  sunny  curls.  They  led  the  usual  life  of 
happy  children,  and  were  devotedly  attached  to  each  other, 
and  to  their  uncle,  Leopold.  They  had  also  two  excellent 
grandmothers,  who  too"k  charge  of  them,  and  endeavored 
to  supply  their  mother's  place. 

From  Albert's  birth,  the  elders  of  his  family  seem  to 
have  looked  forward  to  his  marriage  with  his  little  English 
cousin.  "  She  may  be  another  Charlotte,"  they  wrote  to 
each  other ;  and,  although  they  did  not  write  it,  they  evi- 
dently thought,  "  He  may  be  another  Leopold." 

When  the  Queen  was  collecting  memoranda  for  the  Life 
of  the  Prince  Consort,  she  wrote  to  Count  Arthur  Mens- 
dorff,  then  a  cabinet  minister  in  Vienna  (son  of  Princess 
Sophia  of.  Saxe-Coburg,  a  nobleman  whom  she  had  mar- 
ried "for  love"),  asking  him  to  tell  her  what  he  could 
remember  of  the  visit  paid  by  Ernest  and  Albert  to  his 
father's  chateau  when  they  were  about  nine  years  old.  He 
writes  thus :  — 

"  Albert  was  never  noisy  or  wild.  He  was  always  very  fond 
of  natural  history,  and  of  more  serious  studies.  Many  an  hour 
we  boys  spent  under  the  attic  roof  arranging  and  dusting  the 
collections  we  had  stored  up  there.  He  had  a  turn  for  imita- 
tion, and  a  strong  sense  of  the  ludicrous,  but  was  never  severe 
or  ill-natured,  always  refraining  from  pushing  a  joke  so  far  as  to 
hurt  anybody's  feelings.  From  his  earliest  infancy  he  was  dis- 
tinguished by  his  perfect  moral  purity,  botli  in  word  and  deed, 
and  to  this  he  owed  the  sweetness  of  disposition  which  made 
him  beloved  by  every  one.  ...  In  1839,  when  I  was  serving 
in  the  Austrian  Lancers,  we  met  at  Toplitz,  and  drove  thence 
to  Carlsbad.  Eos,  his  black  greyhound,  was  with  us  in  the 
carriage.  During  our  journey  Albert  confided  to  me,  under  the 
seal  of  the  strictest  confidence,  that  he  was  going  to  England  to 
make  your  acquaintance,  and  that  if  you  liked  each  other  you 
were  to  be  engaged.  He  spoke  very  seriously  about  the  diffi- 
culties of  the  position  he  would  have  to  occupy  in  England,  but 
he  hoped  that  dear  Uncle  Leopold  would  assist  him  with  his 
advice." 


THE  MARRIAGE   OF  QUEEN  VICTORIA.         149 

Prince  Ernest  and  Prince  Albert  were  partly  educated  in 
Brussels  under  the  eye  of  this  "  dear  Uncle  Leopold ;  " 
they  made  walking  excursions,  as  boys  on  the  Continent 
commonly  do,  during  their  summer  vacations,  and  in  1837 
they  both  went  to  the  University  of  Bonn. 

Prince  Albert  was  an  earnest  student,  and  very  fond  of 
music ;  but  he  was  also  good  at  athletic  sports,  even  to 
such  an  extent  as  to  attract  the  admiration  of  some  travel- 
ling Englishmen.  There  were  several  other  German  princes 
at  Bonn  at  this  time,  forming  quite  a  little  society  of  equals ; 
but  the  two  Coburg  Princes  apparently  mixed  freely  with 
their  fellow-students  of  every  social  grade. 

The  year  before,  that  is,  in  1836,  Ernest  and  Albert  had 
been  in  England.  There  it  had  first  been  suggested  to  the 
Prince  that  it  was  the  wish  of  the  united  families  that  he 
might  find  favor  in  the  eyes  of  his  young  cousin,  Princess 
Victoria.  Here  is  a  little  letter  that  he  wrote  his  father,  not 
many  days  before  his  cousin  became  queen  :  — 

"A  few  days  ago  I  received  a  letter  from  Aunt  Kent,  enclos- 
ing one  from  our  cousin.  She  said  I  was  to  communicate  its 
contents  to  you,  so  I  send  it  on  with  a  German  translation. 
The  day  before  yesterday  I  had  a  second  and  still  kinder  letter 
from  my  cousin,  in  which  she  thanks  me  for  my  good  wishes  on 
her  birthday.  You  may  easily  imagine  that  both  these  letters 
gave  me  the  greatest  pleasure." 

But  the  young  cousin  was  not  eager  to  be  won,  and 
Albert  was  sent  to  make  a  tour  in  Italy.  Thence  he  wrote 
letters  full  of  precocious  wisdom,  —  indeed  a  thought  prig- 
gish, it  might  seem  to  some.  They  show  good  judgment, 
but  no  particular  brilliancy  or  originality.  Here,  however, 
is  the  letter  he  wrote  to  his  cousin  on  her  accession  to  the 
throne  :  — 

BONN,  June  26,  1837. 

MY  DEAREST  COUSIN, —  I  must  write  you  a  few  lines  to  pre- 
sent you  my  sincerest  felicitations  on  that  great  change  which 
has  taken  place  in  your  life.  Now  you  are  Queen  of  the  mightiest 
land  of  Europe,  and  in  your  hand  lies  the  happiness  of  millions. 


150    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

May  Heaven  assist  and  strengthen  you  with  its  strength  in  that 
high  but  difficult  task.  I  hope  that  your  reign  may  be  long, 
happy,  and  glorious,  and  that  your  efforts  may  be  rewarded  by 
the  thankfulness  and  love  of  your  subjects.  May  I  pray  you 
to  think  likewise  sometimes  of  your  cousins  in  Bonn,  and  to  con- 
tinue to  them  that  kindness  you  favored  them  with  till  now.  Be 
assured  that  our  minds  are  always  with  you.  I  will  not  be  indis- 
creet, and  abuse  your  time.  Believe  me  always  your  Majesty's 
most  obedient  and  faithful  servant, 

ALBERT. 

Three  days  after  he  writes  to  his  father :  — 

"  Uncle  Leopold  has  written  me  a  great  deal  about  England, 
and  all  that  is  going  on  there.  United  as  all  parties  are  in  high 
praise  of  the  young  Queen,  the  more  do  they  seem  to  manoeuvre 
and  intrigue  with  and  against  each  other.  On  every  side  there 
is  nothing  but  a  net-work  of  cabals  and  intrigues,  and  parties 
are  arrayed  against  each  other  in  the  most  inexplicable  manner." 

So  the  Prince  went  off  to  Italy,  and,  after  the  usual 
Italian  tour,  revisited  England  in  1839.  But  here  a  diffi- 
culty occurred,  which  may  best  be  told  in  the  Queen's  own 
words.  She  writes  in  the  third  person  :  — 

"  Albert  objected  that  if  he  were  kept  waiting  for  the  Queen's 
final  answer  for  several  years  it  would  then  be  too  late  for  him 
to  begin  to  prepare  himself  for  any  new  career,  should  the 
Queen  decide  against  him." 

"The  Queen  says,"  adds  Sir  Charles  Grey,  "that  she 
never  had  any  idea  of  this,  and  she  afterwards  repeatedly 
informed  the  Prince  that  she  never  would  have  married 
any  one  else.  She  expresses,  however,  her  great  regret  that 
she  had  not,  after  her  accession,  kept  up  her  correspon- 
dence with  her  cousin." 

"  Nor  can  the  Queen  now,"  she  writes  herself.  "  think  without 
indignation  against  herself  of  her  wish  to  keep  the  Prince  wait- 
ing for  probably  three  or  four  years,  at  the  risk  of  ruining  all  his 
prospects  for  life,  until  she  might  feel  inclined  to  marry.  And 
the  Prince  has  since  told  her  that  he  came  over  in  1839  with  the 
intention  of  telling  her  that  he  could  not  now  wait  for  a  decision, 
as  he  had  done  at  a  former  period  when  this  marriage  was  first 
talked  about.  The  only  excuse  the  Queen  can  make  for  herself 


THE  MARRIAGE   OF  QUEEN   VICTORIA.        151 

is  in  the  fact  that  the  sudden  change  from  the  secluded  life  of 
Kensington  to  the  independence  of  her  position  as  Queen 
Regnant  at  the  age  of  eighteen  put  all  ideas  of  marriage  out  of 
her  mind,  which  she  now  most  bitterly  regrets.  A  worse  school 
for  a  young  girl,  or  one  more  detrimental  to  all  natural  feelings 
and  affections,  cannot  well  be  imagined  than  the  position  of  a 
queen  at  eighteen  without  experience,  and  without  a  husband  to 
guide  and  support  her.  This  the  Queen  can  state  from  painful 
experience,  and  she  thanks  God  that  none  of  her  dear  daughters 
are  exposed  to  such  danger." 

Three  years  had  passed  since  the  young  cousins  had  met, 
when  on  October  10,  1839,  the  Queen  received  the  Coburg 
Princes  at  the  head  of  the  great  staircase  at  Windsor  Castle. 
On  the  1 5th  the  Queen  informed  Lord  Melbourne  that  she 
had  made  up  her  mind  to  the  marriage.  He  replied  in 
words  she  bitterly  recalled  in  her  after  life,  that  he  was  very 
glad,  for  that  "  a  woman  could  not  stand  alone  for  any  time 
in  any  position." 

But  this  intimation  to  Lord  Melbourne  preceded  the  pro- 
posal of  marriage  which  etiquette  required  should  be  made 
by  the  Queen.  She  sent  for  Prince  Albert  the  next  day, 
inexpressibly  shrinking  from  the  necessity  of  reversing  the 
usual  relations  between  man  and  woman. 

How  the  Prince  received  what  she  had  to  say  to  him  may 
be  read  in  a  letter  he  wrote  at  once  to  Baron  Stockmar :  "  I 
write  to  you,"  he  says,  "  on  one  of  the  happiest  days  of 
my  life,  to  give  you  the  best  news  possible.  Victoria  is  so 
good  and  kind  to  me  that  I  am  often  at  a  loss  to  under- 
stand that  such  affection  should  be  shown  to  me."  And 
the  Queen  on  her  part  tells  us  that  the  Prince  received  her 
offer  without  any  hesitation,  and  with  the  warmest  demon- 
strations of  kindness  and  affection.  After  a  mutual  expres- 
sion  of  their  feelings  of  happiness,  she  adds  that  night  in 
her  diary,  with  the  straightforwardness  and  simplicity  which 
mark  all  the  daily  entries  in  her  journal :  — 

"  How  I  will  strive  to  make  him  feel  as  little  as  possible  the 
great  sacrifice  he  has  made !  I  told  him  it  was  a  great  sacrifice 
on  his  part,  but  he  would  not  allow  it.  I  then  told  him  to  fetch 
Ernest,  who  congratulated  us  both,  and  seemed  very  happy. 
He  told  me  how  perfect  his  brother  was." 


152    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Here,  too,  is  the  letter  in  which  Uncle  Leopold  expresses 
his  joy  at  the  good  news  :  — 

MY  DEAREST  VICTORIA,  —  Nothing  could  have  given  me 
greater  pleasure  than  your  dear  letter.  I  had  when  I  learned 
your  decision  almost  the  feeling  of  old  Simeon:  Now  lettest  Thou 
Thy  servant  depart  in  peace.  Your  choice  has  been  for  these 
last  years  my  conviction  of  what  would  be  best  for  your  happi- 
ness; and  just  because  I  was  convinced  of  this,  and  knew  how 
strangely  fate  often  changes  what  one  tries  to  bring  about  as 
being  the  best  plan  one  could  fix  upon,  I  feared  it  could  not 
happen.  In  your  position,  which  may,  and  will,  perhaps,  become 
in  future  even  more  difficult  in  a  political  point  of  view,  you  could 
not  exist  without  having  a  happy  and  agreeable  interieur;  and  I 
am  much  deceived  (which  I  think  I  am  not),  or  you  will  find  in 
Albert  just  the  qualities  and  disposition  which  are  indispensable 
for  your  happiness,  and  which  will  suit  your  own  character,  tem- 
per, and  mode  of  life.  You  say  most  amiably  that  you  consider 
it  a  sacrifice  on  the  part  of  Albert.  This  is  true  on  many  points, 
because  his  position  will  be  a  difficult  one ;  but  much,  I  may  say 
all,  will  depend  on  your  affection  for  him.  If  you  love  him  and 
are  kind  to  him  he  will  easily  bear  the  bothers  of  his  position, 
and  there  is  a  steadiness,  and  at  the  same  time  a  cheerfulness, 
in  his  character,  which  will  facilitate  this. 

Here  is  again  a  glimpse  of  the  young  pair  as  they  entei 
on  the  familiar  relations  of  their  new  life,  drawn  from  the 
Queen's  journal.  She  is  mounted  on  her  "dear  old 
charger,  Leopold,"  with  her  "beloved  Albert,  looking," 
she  says,  "so  handsome  in  his  uniform,"  to  review  the 
troops.  It  is  piercingly  cold  and  windy.  Albert  draws 
her  fur  cape  closer  round  her  throat  as  a  protection,  but 
she  is  concerned  only  to  think  how  cold  it  must  be  for  him 
in  high  cavalry  boots  and  his  gay  uniform. 

Here,  too,  is  the  Prince's  own  account  of  the  engage- 
ment, written  in  a  letter  to  his  grandmother :  — 

"  The  Queen  sent  for  me  alone  to  her  room  a  few  days  ago, 
and  declared  to  me  in  a  genuine  outburst  of  love  and  affection 
that  I  had  gained  her  whole  heart,  and  that  I  would  make  her 
intensely  happy  if  I  would  make  her  the  sacrifice  of  sharing  her 
life  with  her,  for  she  said  she  looked  on  it  as  a  sacrifice  ;  the 
only  thing  that  troubled  her  was  that  she  did  not  think  herself 


THE  MARRIAGE   OF  QUEEN   VICTORIA.        153 

worthy  of  me.  The  joyous  openness  of  manner  in  which  she 
told  me  this  enchanted  me.  I  was  quite  carried  away  by  it. 
She  is  truly  most  good  and  most  amiable,  and  I  am  sure 
Heaven  has  not  given  me  over  into  evil  hands." 

Here,  too,  is  the  Queen's  account  in  her  own  journal  of 
the  manner  in  which,  after  the  departure  of  Ernest  and 
Albert  for  Germany,  she  announced  her  engagement  to 
her  Privy  Council.  Eighty  gentlemen  were  present  in 
the  Council  Hall  "  when,"  says  the  Queen,  "  I  went  in. 
The  room  was  full,  but  I  hardly  knew  who  was  there. 
Lord  Melbourne  I  saw  looking  kindly  at  me  with  tears  in 
his  eyes,  but  he  was  not  near  me.  I  then  read  my  short 
declaration.  I  felt  that  my  hands  shook,  but  I  did  not 
make  one  mistake.  I  felt  most  happy  and  thankful  when 
it  was  over."  And  then  she  records  that  her  bracelet 
with  the  Prince's  portrait  in  it  had  seemed  to  give  her 
courage. 

I  have  already  said  that  the  announcement  of  her  mar- 
riage in  Parliament  was  attended  with  considerable  Par- 
liamentary altercation  which  annoyed  the  Queen  extremely. 
Prince  Albert  and  his  family,  however,  behaved  with  great 
prudence  and  dignity. 

Late  in  January,  in  bitterly  cold  weather,  the  young 
bridegroom  left  Coburg  and  Gotha  for  the  country  of  his 
adoption.  On  February  6  he  crossed  the  Channel  in  a 
storm  with  a  heavy  sea,  and  the  moment  he  set  foot  on 
land  had  to  collect  himself,  and  appear  equal  to  the  occa- 
sion, receiving  graciously  the  congratulations  showered 
upon  him  by  official  personages,  and  responding  with 
cordiality  to  the  demonstrations  of  the  populace.  The 
hearty  welcome  he  received  was  a  great  relief  to  the 
Prince,  who  had  feared  from  the  debates  in  Parliament, 
concerning  his  allowance,  that  his  marriage  was  not  ac- 
ceptable to  the  country.  The  Prince  brought  hardly  any 
Germans  in  his  suite  ;  but  he  brought  his  beloved  grey- 
hound, Eos,  an  animal  of  rare  intelligence,  whom  he  had 
trained  from  puppyhood.  She  was  jet  black,  except  one 
white  paw,  and  a  white  streak  on  her  nose.  She  died 


154    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

four  years  after  her  master's  marriage,  and  is  buried  on 
the  slopes  at  Windsor. 

The  wedding-day  which  had  opened  cloudy  and  lower- 
ing became  Queen's  weather  as  the  hours  went  on.  The 
streets  were  thronged.  No  scaffoldings  were  erected  in 
the  streets,  but  chairs  were  let  at  one  and  two  dollars 
apiece,  and  the  bare  trees  were  full  of  spectators.  The 
Prince  had  been  lodged  at  Buckingham  Palace.  The 
Chapel  Royal  where  the  wedding  was  to  take  place  was 
at  the  Palace  of  St.  James. 

The  marriage  took  place  February  10,  1840,  at  10  A.  M., 
the  orthodox  hour  at  that  day  for  English  marriages.  The 
Prince  wore  the  uniform  of  a  British  Field  Marshal,  with 
the  collar,  ribbon,  and  other  insignia  of  the  Garter.  The 
Queen  wore  no  diamonds  on  her  head,  but  a  simple  wreath 
of  orange  blossoms.  Her  magnificent  veil  did  not  cover 
her  face,  but  hung  down  over  her  shoulders.  A  pair  of 
very  large  diamond  ear-rings  (Prince  Albert's  gift),  a 
diamond  necklace,  and  the  insignia  of  the  Garter,  were 
all  her  ornaments.  There  were  many  ladies  present. 
The  young  were  all  in  white  dresses.  Every  lady  was 
presented  with  a  wedding  favor  tied  up  with  flowers.  The 
Queen,  on  entering  the  chapel  from  the  interior  of  the 
palace,  wore  her  robes  of  ermine  and  purple.  These, 
before  the  ceremony,  she  laid  aside. 

The  bridegroom  entered  after  the  bride.  His  father 
and  his  brother  were  with  him.  The  contemporary  ac- 
count says,  "  he  held  his  prayerbook  in  his  hand,  and  his 
form,  dress,  and  demeanor  made  every  one  admire  him." 
He  kissed  the  hand  of  the  Queen  Dowager,  and  then 
waited  till  the  Queen  should  be  conducted  to  the  altar 
by  the  Bishops  present. 

Twelve  unmarried  ladies,  daughters  of  dukes,  marquises, 
or  earls,  bore  the  Queen's  train  and  acted  as  bridesmaids. 
The  Queen  looked  moved  and  excited.  Her  dress  was 
white  satin.  Her  lace  was  Honiton. 

On  reaching  the  altar  the  Queen  knelt  in  private  prayer, 
then  took  her  seat  in  the  chair  of  State.  After  a  few  seconds 


PRINCE  ALBERT. 

(At  the  time  of  his  marriage.) 


THE  MARRIAGE   OF  QUEEN  VICTORIA.        155 

she  rose,  and  then,  as  she  stood  beside  her  bridegroom,  the 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury  began  to  read  the  service.  Her 
uncle,  the  Duke  of  Sussex,  gave  her  away. 

The  guns  of  the  Tower  thundered  out  the  announcement 
as  soon  as  the  young  couple  were  pronounced  man  and  wife. 
Then  all  the  wedding  guests  passed  by  them,  and  when  all 
had  gone  the  bride  stepped  aside  and  kissed  the  Queen 
Dowager.  Then,  leaning  on  her  husband's  arm,  she  left  the 
chapel.  They  passed  back  into  the  Throne  Room  of  the 
Palace,  where  the  necessary  parish  register  was  signed. 
They  then  returned  to  Buckingham  Palace  for  breakfast. 
After  the  breakfast  was  over  bride  and  bridegroom  changed 
their  dresses,  —  the  Prince  for  a  dark  travelling  suit,  the 
Queen  for  a  white  satin  pelisse,  trimmed  with  swan's-down, 
with  a  white  satin  bonnet  and  feather.  And  so  ended  this 
sweet  royal  idyl,  and  so  began  their  happy  married  life  of 
one-and-twenty  years. 

Prince  Albert's  was  a  character  that  time  and  experience 
were  calculated  to  ripen.  When  he  married  he  was  scarcely 
more  than  a  very,  very  good  boy;  he  developed  into 
Tennyson's  Ideal  Man,  being  avowedly  King  Arthur  in  the 
"  Idyls  of  a  King."  As  Albert  the  Good  he  will  always  be 
known  and  loved  in  England.  History  will  not  be  able  to 
point  to  one  flaw  in  his  character,  —  to  one  deed  that  the 
sternest  moralist  would  have  wished  undone.  If  he  had  a 
fault  it  was  the  fault  the  lover  in  "  Maud  "  finds  in  the  face 
of  his  mistress,  — "  faultily  perfect."  As  such  he  might 
not  have  commanded  our  sympathies,  had  it  not  been  that 
these  are  all  called  out  by  the  passionate,  tender,  admir- 
ing devotion  of  the  wife  who  so  loved  him,  and  so  mourns 
for  him. 

So  husband  and  wife  settled  down  into  their  married  life, 
in  which  the  extreme  judiciousness  of  the  young  husband  is 
remarkable.  Never  would  he  go  anywhere  by  himself,  but  was 
always  attended  by  an  equerry  when  the  Queen  was  not  with 
him.  He  took  a  tutor  in  English  Constitutional  Law,  and 
he  and  the  Queen  read  Hallam's  "  Constitutional  History  of 
England  "  together.  Together  they  etched,  and  sang,  and 


156    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

played  upon  the  piano  and  the  organ.  Together  they  en- 
joyed everything,  and,  as  time  went  on,  the  Prince  became 
more  and  more  associated  with  the  Queen  in  public  affairs, 
bearing,  however,  always  in  mind  the  maxim  that  his  public 
existence  must  be  merged  in  hers. 

The  late  hours  of  the  court  had  been  at  first  very  trying 
to  him,  but  these  were  soon  modified  as  far  as  the  personal 
habits  of  husband  and  wife  were  concerned.  The  Prince 
read  aloud  a  great  deal  to  the  Queen.  Dinner  was  at  eight 
P.  M.,  and  usually  there  was  company.  In  the  evening  the 
Prince  often  played  at  double-chess  (whatever  that  may  be). 
The  Prince  loved  fresh  air  and  a  country  life ;  his  wife,  whose 
early  years  had  been  passed  in  seclusion,  loved  London  and 
gayety.  It  was  not  long,  however,  before  their  tastes  har- 
monized. Music  was  always  a  great  pleasure  to  the  pair. 
Both  played  and  sang  well.  Lablache  was  the  Queen's 
singing-master  ;  she  herself  says  of  him  most  truly  that 
he  was  not  only  "  one  of  the  finest  bass  singers,  but  one  of 
the  best  actors,  both  in  comedy  and  tragedy.  He  was  also 
a  remarkably  clever,  gentlemanlike  man,  full  of  anecdote  and 
knowledge,  warm-hearted  and  kind.  He  was  very  tall  and 
immensely  large,  but  had  a  remarkably  fine  head  and  coun- 
tenance. He  used  to  be  called  Le  Gros  de  Naples.  The 
Prince  and  Queen  had  a  sincere  regard  for  him.  He  died 
in  1858.  His  father  was  a  Frenchman,  and  his  mother  an 
Irishwoman." 

Who  that  remembers  Lablache,  either  on  the  stage  or  in 
private  life,  will  not  join  heartily  in  these  words  of  apprecia- 
tion from  the  lips  of  his  royal  pupil  ? 

Prince  Albert  played  a  great  deal  on  the  organ.  "To 
the  organ,"  said  one  of  the  ladies  of  the  Household,  "he 
seemed  to  pour  out  his  whole  soul." 

It  was  only  a  few  months  after  their  marriage  when  the 
Queen  and  Prince  went  through  one  of  those  terrible  experi- 
ences which  make  uneasy  many  "  a  head  that  wears  a  crown." 
Here  is  the  Prince's  account  of  what  took  place,  written  to 
his  grandmother :  — 


THE  MARRIAGE    OF  QUEEN   VICTORIA.        157 

BUCKINGHAM  PALACE,  June  ir,  1840. 

DEAR  GRANDMAMMA,  —  I  hasten  to  give  you  an  account  of 
an  event  which  might  otherwise  be  misrepresented  to  you,  which 
endangered  my  life  and  that  of  Victoria,  but  from  which  we 
escaped  under  the  watchful  hand  of  Providence.  We  drove  out 
yesterday,  about  six  o'clock,  to  pay  Aunt  Kent  a  visit,  and  to 
take  a  turn  round  Hyde  Park.  We  drove  in  a  small  phaeton.  I 
sat  on  the  right,  Victoria  on  the  left.  We  had  hardly  proceeded 
a  hundred  yards  from  the  Palace  when  I  noticed  on  the  foot- 
path, on  my  side,  a  little,  mean-looking  man,  holding  something 
toward  me ;  before  I  could  distinguish  what  it  was,  a  shot  was 
fired  'which  almost  stunned  us  both,  it  was  so  loud,  and  fired 
scarcely  six  paces  from  us.  Victoria  had  just  turned  to  the  left 
to  look  at  a  horse,  and  could  not,  therefore,  understand  why  her 
ears  were  ringing,  as,  from  its  being  so  very  near,  she  could 
hardly  distinguish  that  it  proceeded  from  a  shot  having  been 
fired.  The  horses  started,  and  the  carriage  stopped.  I  seized 
Victoria's  hands,  and  asked  if  the  fright  had  not  shaken  her,  but 
she  laughed  at  the  thing.  I  then  looked  again  at  the  man,  who 
was  still  standing  in  the  same  place,  his  arms  crossed,  and  a 
pistol  in  each  hand.  His  attitude  was  so  theatrical  and  affected 
it  quite  amused  me.  Suddenly  he  again  presented  his  pistol, 
and  fired  a  second  time.  This  time  Victoria  also  saw  the  shot, 
and  stooped  quickly,  pulled  down  by  me.  The  ball  must  have 
passed  just  above  her  head.  .  .  .  The  people,  who  had  been 
petrified  at  first,  now  rushed  upon  him.  I  called  to  the  postilion 
to  go  on,  and  we  arrived  safely  at  Aunt  Kent's.  From  thence 
we  took  a  short  drive  through  the  Park,  partly  to  give  Victoria 
a  little  air,  partly  also  to  show  the  public  that  we  had  not,  in 
consequence  of  what  had  happened,  lost  confidence  in  them. .  .  . 
The  name  of  the  culprit  is  Edward  Oxford.  He  is  seventeen 
years  old,  a  waiter  in  a  low  inn,  not  mad,  I  think,  but  quiet  and 
composed. 

The  Prince  early  began  making  public  speeches,  and  he 
spoke  English  very  well,  though  with  a  slight  German 
accent.  His  intercourse  with  the  Queen  was  generally 
held  in  German. 

At  the  time  of  the  marriage,  Lord  Melbourne,  foreseeing 
that  it  could  not  be  long  before  the  Tory  party  would  of 
necessity  come  into  power,  urged  the  Queen  to  modify  her 
dislike  to  them,  and  to  hold  out  the  olive  branch.  This 
view  he  impressed  upon  Prince  Albert.  The  Regency  Bill, 


158    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

passed  before  the  birth  of  the  Queen's  first  baby,  making 
him  Regent  in  case  of  his  wife's  death  leaving  a  child, 
was  passed  without  any  opposition  from  Sir  Robert  Peel 
or  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  and  this  pleased  both  husband 
and  wife.  November  21,  1840,  the  Princess  Royal  (the 
Empress  Frederick)  was  born,  and  the  following  year  the 
English  nation  was  gratified  by  the  birth  of  a  Prince  of 
Wales.  Victoria  Adelaide  Mary  Louise  was  the  little  Prin- 
cess's name.  She  was  in  her  nursery  a  child  of  more  char- 
acter and  more  self-will  than  her  brother,  whom  she  ruled 
completely  in  their  early  days.  The  Queen  and  Prince  had 
their  children  as  much  with  them  as  possible.  The  lady  placed 
over  the  nursery  was  an  admirable  person,  —  Lady  Lyttle- 
ton.  The  children  probably  led  as  healthful,  happy  English 
lives  as  any  in  England.  Not  more  than  a  year  and  a  half 
after  the  Queen's  marriage,  Sir  Robert  Peel  carried  in  the 
House  of  Commons  a  vote  of  want  of  confidence  in  the  Whig 
ministry,  and  Parliament  was  at  once  dissolved,  to  see  if 
a  new  election  would  send  up  to  the  House  members  who 
were  more  favorable  to  Lord  Melbourne's  administration. 
His  position  with  regard  to  the  country  had  long  been  a 
painful  one,  and  he  had  held  on  to  office  because  the  Queen 
could  not  bear  to  part  from  him  whom  she  considered  her 
fatherly  adviser  and  best  friend. 

The  result  of  the  elections  proved  that  the  country  was 
thoroughly  in  opposition  to  Lord  Melbourne  and  his  friends. 
The  ministry  therefore  resigned,  and  Sir  Robert  Peel  and  a 
Tory  cabinet  took  their  place.  Lord  Melbourne  had  given 
the  wisest  advice  to  the  Queen,  concerning  her  relations 
with  her  new  advisers,  and  he  had  also  given  several  hints 
to  Sir  Robert  Peel  as  to  how  the  Queen  liked  to  be  dealt 
with  by  her  ministers  ;  especially  he  told  him  that  she  liked 
everything  explained  to  her  clearly  and  succinctly,  and  that 
he  should  talk  with  her,  and  treat  her,  as  if  she  were  a  man. 
The  question  of  the  Household  was  now  easily  settled  : 
Sir  Robert  was  desirous  of  not  pressing  ungenerously  on  the 
Queen  ;  the  Queen,  advised  by  Lord  Melbourne,  was  ready 
to  make  concessions. 


THE  MARRIAGE   OF  QUEEN  VICTORIA.        159 

Lord  Melbourne  retired  into  strictly  private  life,  but  his 
home  was  lonely.  To  him  his  young  Queen  and  pupil  had 
stood  in  place  of  all  domestic  ties.  He  suffered  from  a 
stroke  of  paralysis ;  he  became  weary  of  life,  and  very 
melancholy.  The  Queen  and  Prince  constantly  wrote  let- 
ters to  him,  and  these  seem  to  have  given  him  some 
comfort  in  his  affliction. 

On  his  death,  in  his  seventieth  year,  in  November,  1848, 
the  Queen  says  in  her  journal :  — 

"  Truly  and  sincerely  do  I  deplore  the  loss  of  one  who  was  a 
most  kind  and  disinterested  friend  of  mine,  and  most  sincerely 
attached  to  me.  He  was  indeed  for  the  first  two  years  and  a 
half  of  my  reign  almost  the  only  friend  I  had,  except  Stockmar 
and  Lehzen,  and  I  used  to  see  him  constantly.  —  daily.  I 
thought  much  of  him  and  talked  much  of  him  all  day." 

But  the  day  of  his  retirement  from  office  may  be  said  to  have 
been  virtually  the  day  he  died  to  his  Queen  and  to  the  world. 

When  I  was  at  boarding-school  in  England,  first  at  Nor- 
wich, and  afterwards  near  London,  from  1831  to  1835, 
O'Connell  was  the  ogre  and  bete  noir  of  those  little  semi- 
conventual  establishments.  My  father  admired  O'Connell. 
Every  girl  with  whom  I  associated  reflected  what  she  heard 
in  her  own  home,  and  believed  him  to  be  an  incarnation  of 
the  devil.  I  had  thus  early  opportunities  of  being  prejudiced 
both  for  and  against  him,  and  even  now  I  could  not  venture 
to  offer  any  estimate  of  his  worth  or  of  his  character.  I 
confine  myself  to  narrative,  merely  saying  that  it  seems  to 
me  O'Connell  was  the  ideal  Irishman,  —  the  Irishman  of 
Irish  fiction,  tender,  turbulent,  and  master  of  vituperation, 
tenacious  of  purpose,  eloquent  of  speech,  active,  audacious, 
belligerent,  and  swayed  more  by  feeling  than  by  reason, 
like  his  countrymen. 

He  was  born  in  August,  1775,  in  the  wildest  and  most 
western  part  of  Ireland.  His  family  had  long  owned  an 
estate  called  Darrynane,  which  at  the  time  of  his  birth  was 
held  by  a  childless  uncle,  who,  however  adopted  him,  and 


l6O    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

made  him  his  heir.  His  father  was  a  tradesman  in  a  coun- 
try town,  carrying  on  a  smuggling  trade  with  France  in 
silks  and  laces.  Another  uncle  had  gone  into  the  French 
service,  and  before  the  Revolution  rose  to  be  Count  O'Con- 
nell  and  a  major-general.  In  1 794,  many  of  the  regiments 
in  the  Irish  brigade  were  drafted  into  the  British  service, 
and  the  General  received  a  colonel's  commission  from  his 
Majesty  George  III. 

Owing  to  the  operation  of  the  Penal  Laws,  no  Irish 
Roman  Catholic  could  openly  receive  a  liberal  education  in 
his  own  country  j  so  Daniel  and  his  brother  were  sent  to 
the  Jesuit  College  at  St.  Omer,  where  they  came  near  being 
among  the  victims  of  Revolutionary  fury  when  the  col- 
lege was  broken  up,  in  1792,  and  its  inmates  dispersed. 
This  early  experience  enlisted  the  sympathies  of  O'Connell 
for  the  Church,  and  against  the  Revolution. 

Having  got  safely  back  to  Ireland,  he  chose  the  law  as 
his  profession ;  for,  as  a  recent  biographer  has  said,  he  "  had 
the  legal  turn  of  the  Irish  mind,  —  subtle,  ready,  disputa- 
tious, acute.  The  warfare  of  the  law  courts  fascinated  the 
Irish,  as  it  has  never  done  the  English.  A  trial  was  an 
arena  in  which  wit  and  craft,  eloquence  and  cunning,  per- 
formed a  drama  which  spectators  fully  understood,  and 
which  they  followed  with  enthusiasm." 

It  was  in  a  law  court  that  O'Connell  changed  his  political 
views, — his  sympathies  having,  in  1794,  been  enlisted  for 
a  prisoner  tried  for  conspiracy  at  the  Old  Bailey.  He 
had  nothing,  however,  to  do  with  the  cause  of  the  United 
Irishmen  in  1798,  being  possibly  prevented  from  joining 
the  society  by  a  serious  illness,  which  laid  him  up  at 
Darrynane. 

It  was  not  long  before  his  power  of  bullying  witnesses, 
his  adroit  and  audacious  way  of  uttering  home  truths  to  the 
judges,  his  wit  and  his  keen  sympathies,  brought  him  great 
popularity  among  his  countrymen,  especially  among  the 
peasantry.  He  also  always  sought  allies  among  the  priests, 
who  at  that  day  possessed  little  education,  but  immense 
power. 


O'CONNELL   AND  IRELAND.  l6l 

As  I  have  said,  after  the  Rebellion  of  1798,  Mr.  Pitt,  see- 
ing the  great  danger  of  a  hostile  Ireland  so  near  the  English 
coast  during  the  continuance  of  such  a  struggle  with  France 
as  he  foresaw,  was  desirous  of  binding  the  two  countries 
together,  and  proposed  two  measures  to  that  end  :  the  union 
of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  and  the  removal  of  Roman 
Catholic  disabilities.  To  this  latter  measure  George  III. 
persisted  he  would  never  give  his  consent,  and  any  allusion 
to  it  brought  on  such  agitation  that  it  was  more  than  once 
almost  fatal,  while  his  mind  was  oscillating  between  insanity 
and  reason.  Pitt  therefore  abandoned  the  measure,  and 
resigned  his  office.  The  Rebellion  of  i  798  was  that  of  the 
United  Irishmen;  that  is,  a  combination  of  the  Presby- 
terians of  Northern  Ireland,  who  sympathized  with  the 
Revolution  in  France,  and  the  Roman  Catholic  peasantry 
in  the  South  of  the  island.  Mr.  Pitt,  before  he  quitted 
office,  procured  some  relief  for  the  Roman  Catholics,  and 
a  very  extended  franchise,  so  that  all  tenants  could  vote 
who  held  leases  for  land  that  paid  rent  forty  shillings  ($10) 
a  year.  At  once  the  Irish  landlords  secured  the  votes  of 
their  tenants,  and  this  laid  the  foundation  of  some  of  the 
hostility  between  landlord  and  tenant,  which  is  the  bane  of 
Ireland  at  this  day. 

No  sooner  was  the  Union  effected  in  1800  than  Irish 
agitation  began,  and  shook  even  the  Imperial  Parliament. 
In  vain  both  Whig  and  Tory  ministers  attempted  to  pacify 
Ireland  by  obtaining  for  Roman  Catholics  instalments  of 
political  "relief."  The  King,  when  sane,  persisted  that 
concessions  would  violate  his  coronation  oath,  and  when 
he  was  insane  the  Prince  Regent  took  refuge  in  his  filial 
duty  not  to  sanction  a  measure  that  if  the  King  recovered 
would  certainly  again  bring  on  his  malady. 

For  some  years  O'Connell's  character  for  turbulence  and 
vituperation  made  him  unacceptable  to  such  of  the  nobility 
and  old  moneyed  men  of  Ireland  as  had  joined  the  popular 
movement.  He  was  the  man  of  the  peasantry ;  butiniSn 
he  became  the  acknowledged  agitator  and  leader  of  the 
Irish  Party. 

ii 


1 62    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

In  1812,  the  Irish,  relying  on  the  promises  of  the  Prince 
Regent,  expected  great  relief  from  his  being  fully  intrusted 
with  the  royal  power.  But  the  Prince  had  ceased  to  be  a 
Whig.  It  cost  him  little  to  break  his  promises.  He  pleaded 
filial  consideration  for  the  opinions  of  his  father.  This  dis- 
appointment roused  in  Ireland  the  most  bitter  feelings. 
O'Connell  declared  openly  for  Repeal,  —  repeal  of  the 
union  between  England  and  Ireland,  —  that  which,  with 
some  federal  modifications,  is  now  known  to  us  as  Home 
Rule.  Of  the  wisdom  of  this  policy  there  may  be  doubt, 
but  of  the  eagerness  and  devotion  of  its  leader  there  can 
be  none. 

In  1815,  O'Connell  fought  a  duel  with  an  Irish  gentle- 
man named  L'Esterre.  The  quarrel  was  first  political,  then 
personal.  O'Connell  fired  low,  not  meaning  to  kill  his 
adversary,  but  unfortunately  wounded  him  so  severely  that 
he  died  the  next  day ;  and  O'Connell  was  filled  with  life- 
long remorse.  He  settled  a  pension  on  L'Esterre's  widow, 
and  never  aftenvards  passed  his  house  without  lifting  his  hat, 
and  making  a  prayer  for  the  repose  of  his  soul.  In  spite  of 
this  remorse,  however,  he  the  same  year  accepted  a  challenge 
from  Peel,  then  Chief  Secretary  for  Ireland.  It  is  hard  to 
imagine  Sir  Robert  Peel  adopting  the  French  plan  of  shoot- 
ing an  irrepressible  political  enemy.  The  duel  happily  did 
not  take  place,  nor  did  O'Connell  ever  fight  again.  He  did 
not,  however,  modify  the  bitterness  of  his  provocations  in 
consequence  of  this  determination. 

In  the  autumn  of  1821,  George  IV.  went  over  to  Ireland, 
and  was  enthusiastically  welcomed  by  the  Irish  people.  He 
received  the  news  of  his  wife's  death  as  he  was  stepping 
ashore,  and  paid  her  the  tribute  of  twenty- four  hours'  retire- 
ment before  he  rushed  into  the  gayeties  that  awaited  him. 
A  temporary  reconciliation  was  proclaimed  between  Catho- 
lics and  Protestants.  O'Connell  was  offered  a  high  law 
position  under  the  Crown,  and,  when  the  King  departed, 
knelt,  and  presented  him  a  laurel  crown.  All  his  life 
he  professed  loyalty  to  his  sovereign,  and  seems  sincerely 
to  have  felt  it.  But  the  bright  hopes  of  1821  were  soon 


Cf  CON  NELL   AND  IRELAND.  163 

clouded  by  disappointment.  The  winter  was  one  of  out- 
rage, agitation,  and  famine. 

It  would  be  useless  here  to  relate  the  plan  of  campaign 
formed  by  O'Connell.  Agitation  for  Catholic  Emancipa- 
tion was  kept  up  till  the  passage  of  the  bill  in  1829,  and 
then,  while  all  England  was  roused  by  the  cry  of  Reform, 
Ireland  was  convulsed  by  agitation  for  Repeal.1 

During  these  years  the  landlord  and  tenant  question 
grew  more  and  more  exasperating  in  Ireland,  and  the 
Roman  Catholic  Relief  Bill,  which  it  had  taken  thirty 
years  to  pass,  had  no  effect  on  the  new  causes  of 
agitation. 

The  bill  admitted  Roman  Catholics  to  Parliament,  and 
to  all  lay  offices  under  the  Crown,  except  those  of  Lord 
Chancellor  or  Lord  Lieutenant  of  Ireland.  Monasteries 
and  the  Jesuits  were  suppressed.  Officials  were  forbidden 
to  wear  the  insignia  of  their  office  at  Roman  Catholic  cere- 
monies. At  the  same  time  the  forty-shilling  franchise  was 
suppressed,  and  the  qualification  for  an  Irish  voter  became 
the  same  as  that  for  an  English  one. 

Meanwhile  O'Connell  had  been  elected  to  Parliament, 
but  he  did  not  take  his  seat  for  some  months,  the  usual 
oaths  that  required  a  new  member  to  abjure  the  Pope  not 
having  been  modified.  He  returned  to  Ireland  furious,  and 
announced  as  his  parliamentary  programme  that  he  should 
agitate  for  a  return  to  the  forty-shilling  franchise ;  an  equal 
distribution  of  the  revenues  of  the  Established  Church 
between  the  poor  of  all  denominations  and  the  most 
meritorious  of  the  Protestant  clergy;  he  would  demand 
the  cleansing  of  the  Augean  stable  of  the  law,  and  the 
abolition  of  "  that  cursed  monopoly,"  the  East  India 
Company. 

1  In  the  spring  of  1846,  I  met  the  Sage  of  Chelsea  and  his  wife 
at  dinner  at  Mr.  Bancroft's  (then  American  Minister  in  England). 
The  conversation  having  turned  on  the  condition  of  Ireland,  Carlyle 
remarked,  half  to  himself  and  half  to  the  company,  that  there  would 
be  no  end  to  disorder  and  agitation  in  Ireland  till  she  was  dipped  for 
twenty-four  hours  under  the  sea.  He  was  subsequently  put  through 
a  course  of  Irish  politics  by  Mr.  Duffy. 


1 64    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

When  he  took  his  seat  in  Parliament  he  proved  himself 
a  great  debater,  and  some  of  his  eloquent  speeches  were  so 
full  of  pathos  that  on  one  occasion  Charles  Dickens,  then  a 
reporter,  laid  down  his  pen,  saying  he  was  too  much  moved 
by  the  speaker's  words  to  write  more  of  his  speech. 

As  he  gave  up  a  large  professional  income  to  attend  to 
his  duties  in  Parliament,  he  allowed  himself  to  be  supported 
by  what  was  called  the  "  Rent."  "  Punch  "  caricatured  him 
ten  years  after,  as  "  The  Great  Beggarman." 

He  spoke  brilliantly  in  the  House  of  Commons  in  favor 
of  the  Reform  Bill,  and  trusted  that  the  Whig  ministry 
would  in  return  do  something  in  favor  of  Repeal ;  but  Lord 
Stanley  expressed  the  feelings  of  the  ministry  when  he  said 
afterwards,  "  Ireland  had  to  be  taught  to  fear  before  she 
could  be  taught  to  love." 

O'Connell  had  taught  the  Irish  how  to  agitate  ;  and  he 
at  length  began  to  find  that  knowledge  turned  against 
himself.  He  was  not  considered  by  the  hot  youth  of  his 
party  to  go  far  enough.  They  said  he  had  done  nothing  to 
effect  Repeal.  We  have  seen  with  what  Irish  enthusiasm 
he  hailed  the  accession  of  the  youthful  Queen ;  and  in 
those  days  he  said  publicly  "  that  he  was  still  for  giving  a 
fair  trial  to  the  Union ;  he  would  confidently  intrust  the 
fortunes  of  the  Irish 'people  to  the  British  Parliament;" 
but  if  the  results  proved  that  Parliament  incapable  of  doing 
justice  to  Ireland,  he  would  "  again  unfurl  the  standard  of 
Repeal." 

The  Young  Ireland  Party,  as  it  was  now  called,  broke  off 
from  the  "  uncrowned  king,"  and  was  in  favor  of  a  resort 
to  arms.-  O'Connell  deprecated  violence.  His  position  was 
that  which  Minerva  enjoined  upon  Achilles  in  his  famous 
quarrel  with  Agamemnon  :  "  Wound  him  with  words  if  thou 
wilt,  but  refrain  from  wounding  him  with  the  sword." 
"O'Connell  was  no  revolutionist,"  says  Justin  McCarthy. 
"  He  had  from  his  education  in  a  French  college  acquired 
an  early  detestation  of  the  principles  of  the  French  Revolu- 
tion. Of  the  Irish  rebels  of  '98  he  spoke  with  as  savage  an 
intolerance  as  the  narrowest  English  Tories  could  show  in 


O'CONNELL  AND  IRELAND.  165 

speaking  of  himself.  .  .  .  He  grew  angry  at  the  slightest 
expression  of  an  opinion  among  his  followers  that  seemed 
to  denote  even  a  willingness  to  discuss  any  of  the  doctrines 
of  Communism." 

.  His  popularity  had  begun  to  wane.  In  1841  his  "tail," 
as  it  was  the  fashion  to  call  his  supporters  in  Parliament, 
was  reduced  to  four.  He  had  been  long  enough  away  from 
Ireland  to  forget  that  it  was  useless  to  talk  reason  to  his 
followers.  Davis,  Duffy,  and  Smith  O'Brien,  —  leaders  of  the 
faction  that  opposed  him,  —  raised  the  enthusiasm  of  their 
followers  by  making  them  believe  themselves  a  nation,  and 
talking  to  them  of  Brian  Boru.  But  O'Connell  had  abated 
no  jot  of  heart  or  hope.  He  prophesied  that  1843  would 
be  the  year  of  Repeal  for  Ireland.  It  was  instead  the 
year  of  his  own  downfall.  He  proposed  to  hold  monster 
meetings  all  over  Ireland.  These  meetings,  attended  by 
from  150,000  to  300,000  people,  were  well  managed  and 
orderly.  The  men  of  each  parish  came  marshalled  by  their 
priests.  O'Connell's  superb  voice  is  said  to  have  reached 
even  to  the  outskirts  of  the  crowd. 

At  last,  on  Oct.  8,  1843,  when  one  of  these  meetings, 
likely  to  number  600,000  people,  was  to  be  held  at  Clontarf 
near  Dublin,  the  Lord  Lieutenant  decided  to  interfere.  He 
issued  a  proclamation  prohibiting  the  meeting,  "  as  calcu- 
lated to  excite  reasonable  and  well  grounded  apprehension." 
Crowds  from  the  surrounding  country  were  already  pouring 
into  Clontarf ;  great  disorder  would  assuredly  have  occurred 
but  for  the  promptitude  of  O'Connell.  He  declared  that 
the  orders  of  the  Lord  Lieutenant  must  be  obeyed.  But 
with  the  suppression  of  the  Clontarf  meeting  O'Connell's 
fate  was  sealed.  The  Irish  national  movement  split  in  two. 
The  Radical  faction  asserted  that  all  done  for  the  cause  by 
their  great  leader  had  been  but  a  gigantic  sham. 

The  Irish  government,  ungrateful  for  the  counter  procla- 
mation which  had  prevented  violence  and  peaceably  dis- 
persed the  crowds  at  Clontarf,  indicted  O'Connell  and  three 
other  Irish  leaders  for  conspiracy,  and  they  were  committed 
to  the  Dublin  jail.  They  appealed,  however,  to  the  House 


1 66    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

of  Lords,  which  reversed  the  sentence  after  they  had  been 
confined  a  year.  But  O'Connell's  health,  as  well  as  power, 
had  been  broken.  He  made  a  last  appearance  in  Parlia- 
ment, "  a  feeble  old  man  muttering  before  a  table."  To 
the  honor  of  the  House  of  Commons,  "  respect  for  the 
great  Parliamentary  personage  kept  all  as  orderly  as  if  the 
fortunes  of  a  party  hung  upon  his  rhetoric." 

He  had  an  eager  wish  before  he  died  to  reach  Rome. 
L'Esterre's  death,  it  is  thought,  was  still  heavy  on  his 
heart,  and  he  desired  a  Papal  assurance  of  forgiveness  and 
benediction.  At  Arras  he  was  visited  by  a  canon  of  the 
cathedral,  who  says  "his  thoughts  seemed  occupied  by 
one  idea,  though  he  forbade  me  to  speak  of  it,  —  the 
misfortunes  of  Ireland  and  the  follies  of  O'Brien." 

In  Paris  the  physicians  told  him  he  was  dying  of  a 
lingering  congestion  of  the  brain,  of  two  or  three  years 
standing.  He  never  reached  Rome.  He  died  in  Genoa, 
May  15,  1847,  "all  the  city  praying  for  him."  He  s<;nt 
his  heart  to  Rome,  but  his  body  is  buried  in  Ireland. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE   CABUL   MASSACRE. 

A  S  we  all  know,  the  first  English  settlement  in  India  was 
•*^-  made  by  a  mere  trading  company,  which  needed  a 
factory,  as  they  called  it,  not  for  purposes  of  manufacture, 
but  to  carry  on  their  commerce  with  the  country.  The 
first  possession  of  the  Crown  of  England  in  India  was  the 
island  of  Bombay,  on  the  west  coast,  received  from 
Portugal  as  part  of  the  dowry  of  Charles  II. 's  queen, 
Catherine  of  Braganza.  Whoever  wishes  to  read  the  early 
history  of  India,  brilliant,  picturesque,  and  without  one 
tedious  word,  will  find  it  in  Lord  Macaulay's  articles  on 
Warren  Hastings  and  Lord  Clive.  Clive  brings  us  to  the 
days  of  Wellington  and  the  battle  of  Assaye ;  that  is,  to 
the  early  years  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

How  the  East  India  Company  enlisted  an  army  of  its 
own,  and  had  its  well-armed  merchant  navy ;  how  it  was 
required  to  accept  a  Governor-General  as  an  appointment 
from  the  cabinet  in  England ;  what  were  its  merits,  and 
what  its  acknowledged  deficiencies,  —  cannot  be  related  here 
within  our  present  compass.  Those  who  wish  to  know  all 
about  the  history  of  the  Company's  Raj  (or  government, 
whence  the  word  Rajah)  must  find  it  elsewhere.  Suffice  it 
to  say  that  the  Indian  Empire  grew,  not  by  design,  but  by 
the  force  of  events,  until,  in  1849,  ^  almost  reached  to  the 
Himalayas  on  the  north,  and  to  the  Indus  on  the  west, 
while  on  the  east  its  limits  were  the  Ganges  and  the  sea. 

The  Empire  had  its  natural  boundaries,  and  British  India 
had  no  call  to  extend  itself  beyond  them.  To  do  so  was, 
in  the  opinion  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  and  of  all  old 
statesmen  who  knew  India  well,  a  very  great  blunder. 


1 68    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

The  British  Government  was  bound  to  keep  in  India  a 
certain  number  of  regiments  of  the  line  (white  men)  ; 
while  the  Company's  troops  were  mainly  Sepoys  (so  called 
from  the  native  word  Sipahis).  The  Sepoys  in  Bengal 
were  native  Hindoos  of  the  soldier,  or  the  Brahmin,  caste, 
commanded  by  English  officers.  The  Company  had  also 
regiments  of  native  cavalry  in  its  pay ;  these  were  principally 
Mohammedans,  and  were  kept  up,  in  consideration  of  a 
subsidy,  by  native  princes. 

Now,  in  the  perpetual  struggle  going  on  between  Eng- 
land and  Russia,  England  seeks  to  prevent  Russia  from 
destroying  the  Turkish  Empire  and  taking  possession  of 
Constantinople,  while  Russia  in  return  threatens  the  peace 
and  permanency  of  her  Indian  Empire.  Russia  also,  desir- 
ing, above  all  things,  outlets  to  the  open  ocean,  would 
probably  very  much  like  to  secure  a  footing  on  the  Persian 
Gulf.  At  present,  she  can  keep  a  fleet  in  the  Black  Sea, 
but  her  war- ships  cannot  pass  the  Dardanelles  and  get  into 
the  Mediterranean.  She  can  keep  a  navy  in  the  Baltic, 
where  it  may  be  frozen  in  hajf  the  year,  and  she  can  main- 
tain one  in  the  White  Sea,  whence,  for  a  few  months  in  the 
year,  her  ships  can  get  out  by  sailing  through  the  Arctic 
Ocean ;  but  she  has  no  open  sea-coast  but  that  of  Siberia 
and  Kamschatka. 

West  of  the  Indus,  between  that  river,  Persia,  and  the 
Persian  Gulf,  lies  the  mountain  kingdom  of  Afghanistan. 
To  the  west  it  borders  upon  Persia ;  southeast  it  is  separated 
from  British  India  by  deserts  and  mountain  passes.  It  has 
three  principal  cities,  Cabul,  Herat,  and  Candahar,  and 
it  is  studded  all  over  with  castles  belonging  to  mountain 
chiefs,  who  lead  a  life  very  like  that  of  the  Free  Barons 
of  the  German  Empire  under  the  feudal  system.  The 
people  are  brave,  warlike,  active,  and  intelligent,  —  a  peo- 
ple to  be  by  no  means  down-trodden  or  despised.  They  are 
all  Mohammedans  ;  to  a  certain  extent  they  are  chivalrous  : 
but  are  proud  of  their  independence,  and  strongly  attached 
to  their  native  hills.  Moreover,  they  know  their  own  value. 
They  knew  that  the  English  wanted  them,  at  the  least,  to 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  169 

be  their  allies  in  their  struggle  with  Russia ;  they  knew  that 
Russia  desired  to  propitiate  them,  for  the  same  reason. 
Perpetual  Russian  intrigues  are  carried  on  with  the  prin- 
cipal chiefs,  and  sometimes  Russia  punishes  their  sovereign 
for  not  listening  to  her  overtures  by  stirring  up  Persia 
against  him.  Living  where  they  do,  they  could  be  crushed 
at  once  if  their  country  were  a  plain ;  but  it  is,  on  the  con- 
trary, a  region  of  snow  mountains,  a  — 

"  Land  of  dark  heath  and  shaggy  wood, 
Land  of  the  mountain  and  the  flood  ;  " 

a  land  of  rocky  crags  and  dangerous  mountain- passes. 
Herat  lies  near  the  frontier  of  Persia.  It  once  was  a  beauti- 
ful city,  with  noble  Saracen  ruins,  and  the  remains  of  a 
Mohammedan  monastery,  with  a  plain  around  it  covered 
with  apple  and  plum  orchards,  —  a  very  garden  of  the  earth, 
shut  in  by  hills.  Herat,  however,  has  not  much  to  do 
with  this  part  of  our  history,  the  scene  of  which  lies  in 
Cabul. 

As  far  back  as  the  summer  months  of  1837,  when  Queen 
Victoria's  reign  began,  the  witches'  caldron  on  these  Afghan 
hills  began  to  boil  and  bubble.  At  that  time  an  English 
officer,  Captain  Alexander  Burnes  (a  relative  of  the  great 
poet  Burns,  though  he  spelled  his  name  differently),  arrived 
as  a  traveller  in  Cabul.  He  was,  however,  directed  by  his 
Government  to  see  what  could  be  done  towards  finding  a 
market  for  English  goods  in  Afghanistan,  and  he  was  well 
received  by  the  Ameer,  Dost  Mohammed. 

Up  to  1713,  Afghanistan  had  had  no  general  govern- 
ment. The  feudal  chiefs  each  governed  his  own  clan,  like 
Highland  chieftains.  In  that  year  an  enterprising  person- 
age took  possession  of  Herat,  and  established  a  sort  of 
dominion  over  the  hill  tribes  and  the  people  of  the  valleys, 
forming  what  was  called  the  Douranee  dynasty.  On  the 
north  and  east  the  Douranee  Empire  was  bounded  by  snow 
mountains  ;  on  the  south  and  west,  by  vast  sandy  plains. 
It  included,  however,  the  fertile  lands  of  Scinde  and  Cash- 
mere. It  separated  British  India  from  Persia,  —  a  country 


I/O    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

very  liable  to  be  swayed  by  Russian  influence,  —  and  it 
formed  an  important  barrier  between  Russian  progress  and 
the  British  power  in  India. 

When  the  nineteenth  century  opened,  the  founder  of  the 
Douranee  dynasty  and  his  successor  were  dead,  and  a 
fratricidal  war  had  broken  out  between  two  brothers.  One 
of  these,  Zermanu  Shah,  was  dethroned  by  his  brother 
Mohammed,  who  put  out  his  eyes,  in  accordance  with  the 
custom  of  the  East ;  and  the  blind,  discrowned  potentate 
sought  an  asylum  in  British  India.  Before  long,  Moham- 
med was  deposed  by  another  brother,  Shah  Soojah-ool- 
Moulk,  a  weak  and  incapable  tyrant,  who  governed  so 
badly  that  his  subjects  rose  up  and  got  rid  of  him.  His 
brother  Mohammed  (whose  eyes  he  had  neglected  to  put 
out)  returned  to  Afghanistan  and  dethroned  him.  Shah 
Soojah  sought  refuge  in  Scinde,  with  its  great  chief,  Runjeet 
Singh,  who  not  only  imprisoned  him,  but  extorted  from 
him  the  glorious  diamond  he  had  with  him,  the  Koh-i-noor, 
the  Mountain  of  Light.  Runjeet  placed  it  in  an  idol 
temple  in  Lahore.  It  was  there  captured  about  twenty- 
one  years  later  by  the  soldiers  of  an  English  regiment,  who 
were  persuaded  by  their  officers  to  present  it  to  Queen 
Victoria. 

Shah  Mohammed  governed  just  as  ill  as  Shah  Soojah,  so 
that  his  subjects  were  well  pleased  when  his  Vizier,  Futteh 
Khan,  deposed  him.  Futteh  again  was  deposed  by  his 
younger  brother,  Dost  Mohammed.  And  here  we  reach  a 
name  of  real  importance  in  history. 

We  must  understand,  therefore,  that  when  Queen  Vic- 
toria came  to  her  throne,  Dost  Mohammed  was  ruler  of 
Afghanistan,  with  the  exception  of  Herat  and  Scinde. 
Herat  was  governed  by  a  descendant  of  the  early  Dour- 
anee conqueror,  and  Scinde,  which  had  broken  away  from 
Afghanistan,  was  governed  by  its  own  ruler,  Runjeet  Singh. 
Shah  Soojah  had  made  his  escape  out  of  that  chieftain's 
hands  in  1833,  and  was  living  on  a  pension  paid  him  by 
the  English  Government. 

Now,  as  Napoleon  had  pointed  out  to  the  Emperor  Paul, 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  IJi 

the  way  to  British  India  lies  through  Afghanistan.  There 
are  but  two  practicable  passes  southwestward  over  the  great 
mountain  chain,  and  both  are  reached  through  Afghanistan. 
These  are  the  Khyber  Pass  and  the  Bolan  Pass.  The  Khyber 
is  sixty  miles  long ;  and  the  Bolan,  more  to  the  south,  is 
both  dangerous  and  difficult.  Those  who  in  former  days 
have  crossed  the  Alps  by  the  Pass  of  the  St.  Gothard,  where 
Suwarrow  and  the  Russians  fought  every  inch  of  the  way 
with  Massena  and  his  Frenchmen,  will  remember  how  on 
each  side  of  them  rose  high  cliffs  that  seemed  to  touch  the 
sky,  while  far  below,  at  the  bottom  of  these  cliffs,  rushes  a 
rocky,  narrow,  foaming  river.  What  the  St.  Gothard  Pass  is 
for  about  eight  miles,  the  Khyber  was  for  sixty. 

When  Alexander  Burnes  found  himself  in  Cabul  in  1837, 
Russia  was  making  strenuous  efforts  to  form  an  alliance 
with  Dost  Mohammed,  a  sovereign  of  ability  and  vigor, 
much  liked  and  admired  by  his  own  people.  The  Russians 
had  already  incited  Persia  to  attack  the  ruler  of  Herat,  and 
hoped  thus  to  acquire  a  footing  in  the  northwestern  corner 
of  Afghanistan. 

Dost  Mohammed  preferred  an  alliance  with  the  English, 
and  he  urged  Captain  Burnes  to  procure  him  a  sum  of 
money  from  the  English  Government,  on  receipt  of  which 
he  said  he  would  send  the  Russian  envoys  out  of  his  domin- 
ions, and,  in  case  of  need,  put  all  his  splendid  cavalry  at  the 
disposition  of  the  English,  if  England  would  pay  for  their 
services. 

Alexander  Burnes  believed  him  quite  sincere,  as  the 
world  in  general  has  long  since  done ;  but  that  was  not  the 
view  of  the  matter  taken  by  Lord  Auckland,  then  Governor- 
General  of  India,  or  by  Lord  Palmerston,  Minister  for  For- 
eign Affairs.  Economy  in  India  was  just  then  the  order 
of  the  day.  Lord  Palmerston  and  Lord  Auckland  thought 
they  could  attain  their  end  more  cheaply  than  by  paying 
^100,000  a  year  to  Dost  Mohammed.  They  drew  Shah 
Soojah  out  of  his  retirement,  made  believe  that  he  was  the 
darling  of  the  Afghan  people,  stigmatized  Dost  Mohammed 
as  a  usurper,  and  picked  a  quarrel  with  him  because  he 


1/2     ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

was  trying  to  recover  the  lost  province  of  Scinde  from 
Runjeet  Singh.  It  was  resolved  to  push  a  British  army 
across  the  Indus,  and  then,  through  the  Khyber  and  Bolan 
Passes,  advance  on  Cabul  and  Candahar.  Shah  Soojah, 
under  British  protection,  was  to  remount  the  throne  from 
which  he  had  been  driven  twenty  years  before. 

In  vain  the  Duke  of  Wellington  deprecated  sending  a 
British  army  across  the  Indus,  which,  he  said,  was  British 
India's  natural  northwest  boundary.  In  vain  old  gover- 
nor-generals represented  the  rashness  of  the  enterprise. 
In  vain  Alexander  Burnes  wrote  moving  letters  on  behalf 
of  Dost  Mohammed.  In  vain  the  Sepoy  troops  mutinied 
when  they  learned  they  were  to  be  ordered  to  climb  frozen 
heights  and  invade  a  foreign  land.  Lord  Palmerston  held 
to  his  policy,  Lord  Auckland  carried  it  out ;  and  on  Novem- 
ber 29,  1838,  in  the  dominions  of  Runjeet  Singh,  at  the  foot 
of  the  Himalayas,  a  grand  review  was  held  of  what  was  then 
called  The  Army  of  the  Indus.  In  all  there  were  fifteen 
thousand  men,  chiefly  Sepoys,  with  English  officers ;  but 
the  camp  followers  of  the  soldiers  outnumbered  them  four 
to  one.  Six  thousand  of  these  men  in  the  Army  of  the 
Indus  were  under  the  command  of  a  cruel,  vicious  tyrant, 
son  of  Shah  Soojah,  called  Prince  Timour.  These  were  to 
go  through  the  Khyber  Pass,  while  nine  thousand  others, 
under  the  command  of  Sir  John  Keene,  were  to  take  their 
way  through  the  Bolan  Pass,  approaching  Cabul  from  the 
south. 

The  army  marched  through  Scinde,  Shah  Soojah  stirring 
up  opposition  and  discontent  wherever  he  passed.  It 
crossed  the  Indus  January  16,  1839,  and  had  then  one 
hundred  and  forty-six  miles  to  march  across  a  desert  of 
hard  salt,  mixed  with  sand,  to  the  mouth  of  the  Bolan  Pass. 
The  sufferings  of  the  Hindoos  were  terrible,  and  the  route 
was  strewn  with  the  dead  bodies  of  their  camels,  of  which 
they  had  had  thirty  thousand  at  the  start. 

Here  is  a  description  of  what  they  endured  when  they 
entered  the  Pass  :  — 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  173 

"  The  Bolan  Pass  is  nearly  sixty  miles  in  length,  of  continued 
and  often  very  rapid  ascent,  shut  in  with  stupendous  or  wooded 
cliffs  on  either  side.  The  joyful  sound  of  rushing  waters  was 
here  to  be  heard ;  but  it  little  availed  the  thirsty  troops,  for  the 
torrent  which  roared  by  their  side  was  polluted  by  the  multitude 
of  dead  animals  which  had  fallen,  or  been  thrown,  into  it  by  the 
advanced  columns.  The  road  was  composed  of  sharp  flint 
stones,  which  lamed  the  cattle,  and  such  as  fell  behind  were 
immediately  seized  by  the  marauding  tribes  which  infested  the 
flanks  and  rear  of  the  army.  The  road  was  strewed  with  bag- 
gage, abandoned  tents,  and  stores  and  luxuries  which  a  few 
weeks  before  or  after  would  have  fetched  their  weight  in  gold. 
These  were  now  cast  aside,  or  left  to  be  trampled  by  cattle  in 
the  rear." 

At  length  the  worn-out  troops  emerged  from  the  Pass, 
and  beheld  with  unspeakable  joy  an  open  valley  stretched 
out  before  them. 

"  The  clear,  crisp  climate,"  says  another  eye-witness, 
"  braced  the  European  frame ;  and  over  the  wide  plain, 
bounded  by  mountain  ranges,  intersected  by  many  spark- 
ling streams,  and  dotted  with  orchards  and  vineyards,  the 
eye  ranged  with  delight." 

But  now  supplies  failed  them.  The  army  was  brought 
almost  to  the  verge  of  starvation.  Water,  too,  failed ;  not 
enough  could  be  got  with  which  to  mix  the  medicines. 

At  last  Timour,  Shah  Soojah,  and  their  army,  which  had 
entered  Afghanistan  by  the  Khyber  Pass,  reached  Candahar. 
At  Candahar  the  English  officers  soon  found  out  how  en- 
tirely fictitious  was  the  supposed  attachment  of  the  Afghans 
to  Shah  Soojah  and  his  dynasty.  His  unpopularity  was 
immense.  He  had  brought  the  Feringhees  into  the 
country  to  displace  Dost  Mohammed,  who  was  generally 
admired  and  beloved  ! 

Candahar  was  three  hundred  miles  from  Cabul,  through 
a  beautiful  country;  but  Shah  Soojah's  army  on  its  way 
had  to  pass  or  take  the  fortress  of  Ghuznee.  It  was  cap- 
tured accordingly ;  but  it  was  there  that  Shah  Soojah  made 
formidable  enemies  of  the  great  fanatical  religious  body, 
the  Ghiljzees,  fifty  of  whom  he  caused  to  be  cut  to 


1/4    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

pieces  at  his  feet,  after  they  had  surrendered  themselves 
prisoners. 

The  capture  of  Ghuznee  took  from  Dost  Mohammed  all 
confidence  in  his  own  power  to  resist  the  British  arms  ;  but 
he  still  made  a  brave  and  determined  stand.  His  army 
however,  was  melting  away.  In  vain  he  urged  his  people 
to  stand  by  him  while  he  made  one  last  charge  on  the 
enemy.  "  In  that  onset,"  he  exclaimed,  "  I  shall  fall ;  then 
go  and  make  your  own  terms  with  Shah  Soojah."  But  his 
appeal  was  made  in  vain.  With  tears  in  his  eyes,  he 
turned  his  horse's  head  and  fled  to  Cabul,  whence  he 
made  his  way  into  the  Himalayas,  and  subsequently  passed 
the  range  into  Bokhara. 

August  7,  1839,  Shah  Soojah,  with  all  imaginable  pomp, 
made  his  entry  into  Cabul  his  capital ;  but  no  voices  bade 
him  welcome. 

On  the  news  reaching  England,  General  Keene  was 
raised  to  the  peerage,  and  knighthood  was  bestowed  on 
other  prominent  officers.  But  Wellington,  and  others  who 
could  judge  of  the  reality  of  the  success,  still  maintained 
that  the  English  army  had  better  take  warning  from  the 
tale  of  Moscow. 

At  the  Indian  entrance  of  the  Khyber  Pass  stands  the 
fortified  city  of  Jellalabad.  This  place  received  a  strong 
European  garrison.  Cabul  was  a  walled  town  dominated 
by  a  citadel  called  the  Bala-Hissar.  In  this  was  the  palace 
of  the  Shah. 

It  did  not  take  long  for  the  English  agent,  Sir  William 
Macnaughten,  to  find  out  that  it  would  be  necessary  to  keep 
a  large  and  permanent  garrison  of  English  troops  in  Cabul 
if  Shah  Soojah  was  to  be  maintained  upon  his  throne ;  for, 
the  moment  the  English  should  march  away,  his  subjects 
would  dethrone  him,  and  restore  Dost  Mohammed,  whom 
the  English  policy  had  now  doubtless  converted  into  a 
bitter  enemy.  Nevertheless,  the  English  officers  who  were 
married  sent  for  their  wives  and  children  as  soon  as  it  was 
determined  that  a  large  English  force  should  remain  in 
Cabul  till  Shah  Soojah  was  firmly  seated  on  his  throne. 


THE   CABUL   MASSACRE.  175 

When  I  speak  of  the  "  English "  troops,  it  must  be  un- 
derstood that  about  four-fifths  of  these  were  Sepoys,  under 
English  officers. 

One  great  difficulty  made  itself  felt  during  the  winter  of 
1840  :  Cabul  was  under  three  authorities,  —  Shah  Soojah,  the 
native  ruler ;  Sir  William  Macnaughten,  the  English  agent ; 
and  Sir  Wilson  Cotton,  the  English  commanding  general. 

Meantime  war,  pillage,  and  disorder  went  on  through- 
out the  country.  Shah  Soojah  insisted  on  using  the  English 
troops  to  collect  his  taxes,  and,  in  spite  of  all  that  could  be 
done  by  British  officers,  all  manner  of  wrongs  and  outrages 
were  committed  on  his  unfortunate  subjects.  Especially 
the  fierce  tribe  of  Ghiljzees,  hereditary  enemies  of  his 
dynasty,  were  opposed  to  him ;  and  a  defeat  they  suffered 
from  his  troops  by  no  means  made  them  more  placable. 

Meantime  a  party  of  English  chased  Dost  Mohammed 
beyond  the  mountains  and  into  the  hands  of  that  cruel 
and  perfidious  tyrant,  the  Khan  of  Bokhara,  whose  domin- 
ions have  since  been  absorbed  by  Russia.  Dost  Moham- 
med, however,  escaped  from  the  Khan's  hands,  and 
succeeded  in  raising  another  body  of  followers.  When 
reminded  that  his  wives  and  children  were  in  the  hands 
of  the  British,  he  answered,  "  I  have  no  family ;  I  have 
buried  my  children  and  my  wives." 

Soon  all  the  northern  provinces  of  Afghanistan  were  in  a 
flame.  Afghan  troops  raised  by  Shah  Soojah  went  over 
to  Dost  Mohammed.  He  did  not,  however,  succeed  at  this 
time,  but  was  again  defeated,  and  driven  into  exile. 

"  I  am  like  a  wooden  spoon,"  he  said ;  "  you  may  toss 
me  as  you  will,  you  will  not  hurt  me."  Three  months 
later,  however,  after  a  skirmish  in  which  he  had  displayed 
desperate  bravery,  and  obtained  some  advantage  over  the 
English,  as  Sir  William  Macnaughten  was  making  prepara- 
tions to  draw  off  his  troops  to  Cabul,  word  was  brought  him 
that  an  Ameer  wished  to  speak  with  him.  To  his  amaze- 
ment, this  man  was  Dost  Mohammed,  who,  dismounting 
from  his  weary  horse,  put  his  sword  into  Sir  William's  hand, 
and  surrendered  himself  prisoner.  He  had  ridden  over 


1/6    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

sixty  miles,  and  had  been  twenty-four  hours  in  the  saddle. 
He  was  treated  with  the  greatest  kindness  and  distinction, 
and  Macnaughten,  on  sending  him  with  a  strong  escort  to 
Hindoostan,  wrote  to  the  Governor-General :  — 

"  I  hope  the  Dost  will  be  treated  with  liberality.  The  case  of 
Shah  Soojah  is  not  parallel.  The  Shah  had  no  claim  on  us  ;  we 
had  no  hand  in  depriving  him  of  his  dominion.  Whereas  we 
ejected  the  Dost,  who  had  never  offended  us,  in  support  of  our 
policy,  of  which  he  was  the  victim." 

As  time  went  on,  there  were  conflicts  of  authority  and 
heart-burnings  among  the  English  generals.  One  by  one 
resigned,  till  the  command  devolved  on  General  Elphin- 
stone,  a  kind-hearted  old  gentleman,  a  martyr  to  the  gout, 
and  little  acquainted  with  the  management  of  native  troops, 
but  who  had  served  with  credit  under  Wellington  in  the 
Peninsular  War.  Dost  Mohammed,  being  in  the  hands  of 
the  English,  the  chieftainship  among  his  supporters  fell  to 
his  son,  Akbar  Khan.  The  three  chief  English  generals 
under  Elphinstone  were  Nott,  Pollock,  and  Sale.  The 
last,  with  a  strong  force,  was  placed  in  garrison  at  Jellala- 
bad  to  guard  the  Khyber  Pass,  while  Lady  Sale,  his  wife, 
remained  at  Cabul,  with  the  rest  of  the  English  women 
and  children. 

The  military  force  at  Cabul  consisted  of  one  English 
regiment,  two  Sepoy  regiments,  two  Afghan  regiments, 
some  artillery  and  cavalry,  five  thousand  fighting  men  in 
all,  and  fifteen  thousand  camp  followers. 

Instead  of  putting  stores,  men,  and  artillery  into  the 
citadel  of  Cabul,  the  Bala-Hissar,  Elphinstone  encamped 
his  men  outside  the  city,  separated  them  from  their  store- 
houses, and  left  the  city  undefended,  while  every  day  hatred 
of  Shah  Soojah  and  his  English  allies  increased. 

Macnaughten  was  on  the  point  of  setting  out  for  India, 
so  secure  did  he  feel  that  things  were  going  on  satisfactorily 
at  Cabul,  when,  on  the  night  of  November  2,  1841,  the 
house  of  Sir  Alexander  Burnes  was  attacked  by  a  mob. 
Burnes  had  made  himself  obnoxious  in  Cabul  because  he 
encouraged  breaches  of  domestic  discipline  among  Afghan 


THE    CABUL  MASSACRE.  177 

ladies  of  rank,  who  were  only  too  ready  to  receive  atten- 
tions from  him.  He  and  his  brother,  after  exhausting 
every  endeavor  to  gain  the  good-will  of  their  assailants, 
were  brutally  murdered  while  trying  to  escape  from  their 
house  by  a  back  way.  Next  the  house  of  the  paymaster 
of  Shah  Soojah's  forces  was  attacked,  a  sum  of  ^17,000 
was  stolen,  and  riot,  murder,  and  pillage  spread  all  over 
the  city.  Meantime  the  British  troops  remained  quiet  in 
their  cantonments.  General  Elphinstone  would  not  order 
them  to  act.  The  fort  that  contained  provisions  and 
ammunition  was  taken  by  the  rioters,  besides  other  sup- 
plies which  had  been  carelessly  stored. 

After  the  loss  of  all  provisions  and  army  stores,  it  became 
evident  to  every  man  among  the  British  that  the  army 
could  not  pass  the  winter  in  Cabul.  There  were  also 
rumors  among  them  that  Shah  Soojah  was  concerned  in 
the  plots  against  them.  The  charm  of  their  invincibility 
was  broken.  A  slight  check,  however,  was  given  on 
November  10  to  the  Afghans,  and  the  English  began  to 
contemplate  what  they  called  "a  not  inglorious  retreat." 
Assistance  was  invoked  from  the  British  garrisons  at  Jella- 
labad  and  Candahar ;  but  the  authorities  in  these  places 
decided  that  to  despatch  soldiers  to  Cabul  would  be  simply 
sending  fresh  victims  to  the  slaughter. 

In  an  outlying  position  one  brave  Goorka  regiment  per- 
ished entirely ;  only  one  private  and  two  officers  survived 
to  bear  the  news  into  Cabul.  After  this  the  only  chance 
for  the  doomed  army  would  have  been  to  take  refuge  in 
the  Bala-Hissar  and  hold  out,  if  their  provisions  would 
last,  till  succor  came  to  them.  The  generals,  however,  dis- 
agreed, the  citadel  was  abandoned,  and  it  was  resolved  to 
open  negotiations  for  the  capitulation  of  the  army. 

The  Afghans  would  hear  of  no  terms  but  unconditional 
surrender.  This  Macnaughten  refused.  "We  shall  meet, 
then,"  said  the  Afghan  leader,  "  on  the  field  of  battle." 
"At  all  events,"  replied  Macnaughten,  "at  the  Day  of 
Judgment." 

"  Strange  to  say,  while   this  conference  was  going  on, 


1/8    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

the  Afghan  soldiers,  fully  armed,  were  giving  food  to  the 
soldiers  of  the  English  regiments,  and  shaking  hands  with 
them." 

Soon  after,  Akbar  Khan,  son  of  Dost  Mohammed,  rode 
into  the  Afghan  camp.  His  arrival  was  hailed  by  his  own 
people,  and  gave  a  gleam  of  hope  to  the  English.  Never- 
theless, in  a  few  days  their  case  became  so  desperate  that 
a  capitulation  was  agreed  upon,  more  dishonorable  than 
had  ever  happened  to  English  arms. 

The  British  army  was  to  evacuate  Afghanistan  as  speedily 
as  possible  by  the  Khyber  Pass,  receiving  assistance  in 
transportation  and  provisions.  When  the  troops  reached 
Peshawar,  Dost  Mohammed  and  his  family  were  to  be 
restored  to  Cabul,  and  Shah  Soojah  was  to  return  to 
India.  The  Afghans  then  were  to  enter  into  an  alliance 
with  England. 

On  December  13, 1841,  in  the  depth  of  winter  (and  Cabul 
stands  six  thousand  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea),  the 
small  body  of  troops  still  remaining  in  the  Bala-Hissar  were 
marched  out  to  begin  their  retreat,  Shah  Soojah  remaining 
within  its  walls.  The  moment  the  soldiers  left  the  citadel 
its  guns  were  turned  upon  them,  slaughtering  indiscrimi- 
nately friend  and  foe.  That  night  the  soldiers  passed 
unsheltered  in  the  snow,  unprovided  with  covering  or  pro- 
visions. Nothing,  too,  would  satisfy  the  rabble  that 
swarmed  around  them  but  obtaining  possession  of  their 
arms.  Imagine  the  condition  of  Sepoys,  used  to  a  tropi- 
cal climate,  under  these  circumstances  ! 

That  night  a  proposal  was  made  to  Macnaughten  on  the 
part  of  Akbar  Khan  to  murder  one  of  the  chief  Afghan 
supporters  of  Shah  Soojah,  and  relieve  the  English,  pro- 
vided he  was  handsomely  paid  for  doing  so.  Macnaughten 
replied  that  the  English  never  paid  for  murder,  but  un- 
happily consented  to  see  Akbar,  and,  if  possible,  to  treat 
with  him.  Some  of  the  officers  about  Macnaughten  sus- 
pected treachery ;  but  he  saw  in  the  proposal  a  ray  of  hope, 
and,  as  he  said,  "  Death  would  be  preferable  to  the  life  of 
anxiety  he  had  been  leading  for  six  weeks  past." 


THE    CABUL   MASSACRE.  179 

Macnaughten  and  three  officers  of  his  staff  met  Akbar 
on  a  hillock  near  the  banks  of  the  Cabul  River,  about  six 
hundred  yards  from  the  English  camp.  "  The  English 
officers  and  Afghan  chiefs  exchanged  salutations,  and 
Akbar  Khan  received,  with  many  thanks,  an  Arab  horse 
which  he  had  coveted.  He  also  returned  thanks  for  a 
pair  of  pistols  which  had  been  presented  to  him  the  pre- 
ceding day.  It  was  then  proposed  that  they  should  all 
dismount,  which  was  done." 

Soon  the  Afghans  began  closing  in  upon  the  English 
party.  Two  of  the  English  officers  remonstrated,  when 
Akbar  suddenly  cried,  "Seize!  Seize  !"  and  the  envoy 
and  his  party  were  grasped  from  behind.  Macnaughten 
was  grappled  by  Akbar  himself.  As  he  struggled,  the 
Afghan  chief  drew  one  of  the  pistols,  given  him  the  day 
before,  from  his  belt,  and  shot  him  through  the  back.  The 
Afghans  rushed  upon  him  with  their  knives,  and  he  was 
literally  cut  to  pieces.  His  mangled  remains  were  carried 
to  the  Great  Bazaar  of  Cabul,  exulted  over,  and  treated  with 
indignity.  One  of  his  staff  died  with  him ;  two  others 
remained  prisoners,  but  wounded. 

The  envoy  was  killed  in  broad  daylight  by  foul  treachery, 
on  an  open  plain;  but  the  English  army  was  so  utterly 
spirit-broken  that  no  attempt  was  made  to  resent  or  to 
avenge  his  murder.  A  few  hours  after,  General  Elphin- 
stone,  utterly  incapacitated  by  illness,  signed  a  new  treaty, 
giving  up  most  of  the  cannon,  most  of  the  men's  guns,  and 
six  hostages  for  the  return  of  Dost  Mohammed.  In  vain 
Major  Eldred  Pottinger,  the  hero  of  Herat,  whose  exploits 
I  have  here  no  space  to  tell,  urged  that  they  should  either 
cut  their  way  through  the  enemy,  or  take  refuge  in  the 
Bala-Hissar. 

When  the  men  had  to  give  up  their  guns,  they  realized 
their  humiliation.  At  length  all  was  accomplished,  and 
the  army  set  out,  "  more  depressed,"  says  Alison,  "  than 
the  French  in  their  retreat  from  Moscow." 

"Deep  snow,"  says  an  eye-witness,  "covered  every  inch  of 
mountain  and  plain  with  one  unspotted  sheet  of  dazzling  white; 


180    ENGLAND   IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

and  so  intensely  bitter  was  the  cold  as  to  penetrate  and  defy  the 
defences  of  the  warmest  clothing.  Sad  and  suffering,  issued 
from  the  British  cantonments  a  confused  mass  of  Europeans 
and  Asiatics,  —  a  mingled  crowd  of  men  of  various  climes  and 
various  complexions  and  habits,  —  part  of  them  peculiarly  un- 
fitted to  endure  the  hardships  of  a  rigorous  climate,  and  many 
of  a  sex  and  tender  age  which  generally  exempts  them  from 
such  scenes  of  horror." 

The  number  of  the  crowd  was  large,  being  forty-five  hun- 
dred fighting  men,  of  whom  seven  hundred  were  English. 
They  had  six  guns,  and  three  mounted  train  field-pieces ; 
they  were  also  encumbered  by  twelve  thousand  camp-fol- 
lowers. As  fast  as  they  left  the  gates  of  the  cantonments 
the  Afghans  began  to  fire  on  them,  and  to  fill  the  air  with 
loud  exulting  cries.  Soon  order  was  completely  lost; 
troops  and  camp-followers,  horses  and  foot-soldiers,  bag- 
gage, public  and  private  property,  became  mixed  up  in 
inextricable  confusion.  Night  came  on  as  they  pursued 
their  weary  course  ;  but  around  them  the  snow  was  lit  up 
by  reflections  from  the  British  Residency  at  Cabul,  which 
had  been  set  on  fire  by  the  Afghans  the  moment  the  troops 
were  out  of  the  city.  The  next  day  the  march  of  the  fugi- 
tives was  still  more  distressing. 

"  Two  of  the  guns,"  says  Lieutenant  Eyre,  an  eye-witness, 
whose  book  the  Duke  of  Wellington  praised  warmly  to  Charles 
Greville,  —  "  two  of  the  eight  guns  were  abandoned,  as  the  horses 
were  unable  to  pull  them  through  the  snow.  Although  by  night- 
fall we  had  only  accomplished  six  miles  of  our  weary  journey, 
the  road  was  covered  with  dying  wretches,  perishing  under  the 
intolerable  cold.  The  Sepoys,  patient  and  resigned,  sank  on 
the  line  of  march,  awaiting  death.  Horses,  ponies,  baggage- 
wagons,  and  camp-followers  and  soldiers,  were  confusedly 
huddled  together,  while  over  all,  the  long  guns  of  the  Afghans, 
posted  on  the  heights  above,  sent  a  storm  of  balls,  every  one  of 
which  took  effect  upon  the  multitude." 

Before  night  the  enemy  had  gained  possession  of  four 
other  cannon.  The  soldiers,  weary,  frost-bitten,  and  starv- 
ing, could  no  longer  make  any  resistance. 


THE    CABUL  MASSACRE.  l8l 

"  The  army  was  in  this  dreadful  state  when  it  reached  the 
entrance  of  the  Coord  Cabul  defile.  This  narrowest  part  of 
the  Khyber  Pass  is  five  miles  in  length,  and  bordered  on  each 
side  with  steep  overhanging  mountains.  It  is  so  narrow  that 
the  sun  never  shines  there.  There  is  hardly  room  for  a 
narrow  rugged  pathway  between  the  torrent  and  the  preci- 
pices. The  stream  dashes  down  the  whole  way  with  incon- 
ceivable velocity,  and  requires  to  be  crossed  in  the  five  miles 
eight-and-twenty  times.  To  add  to  the  horrors  of  this  defile, 
horses  and  beasts  of  burden  could  not  keep  their  footing  on 
the  ice." 

The  wretched  animals,  struggling  to  preserve  their  foot- 
hold, slipped  in  great  numbers  into  the  roaring  water. 
The  heights  above  were  crowded  by  Afghans,  who,  in 
perfect  security  themselves,  kept  up  an  incessant  fire 
on  the  confused  and  trembling  multitude  in  the  deflle 
beneath  them. 

The  massacre  was  fearful  in  that  dreadful  gorge.  Three 
thousand  perished  under  the  guns  and  knives  of  the  Af- 
ghans ;  and  the  English  ladies,  struggling  with  the  rest, 
frequently  lost  sight  of  their  own  children. 

After  passing  through  the  defile,  such  as  survived  came 
on  a  high  tableland,  where  snow  was  falling  in  great  flakes, 
and  rendering  the  road  almost  impassable  for  the  great 
mass  of  the  poor  creatures  born  in  the  tropics.  That  night 
a  cold  biting  wind  swept  over  the  lofty  bare  surface  of  the 
mountain,  rendering  it  almost  certain  death  to  sit  down  in 
the  snow,  however  weary.  They  had  only  four  tents.  One 
was  given  to  the  sick  General ;  two  to  the  English  women 
and  children  ;  one  to  the  sick.  That  night  Akbar  Khan  sent 
in  a  proposition  that  he  should  be  intrusted  with  the  women 
and  children,  promising  to  keep  them  a  day's  march  in 
the  rear  of  the  army,  and  in  pefect  safety.  After  consider- 
erable  negotiation,  the  married  officers  were  allowed  to 
accompany  their  wives,  and  soon  after  the  unhappy  band 
were  placed  in  the  hands  of  the  murderer  of  Macnaughten, 
the  husband  of  one  of  their  number. 

Here  is  Lieutenant  Eyre's  account  of  the  delivery  of  the 
women  and  children  into  the  hands  of  Akbar :  — 


1 82    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  It  was  now  the  third  day,  January  9,  1842 ;  and  scarcely  one 
of  the  ladies  had  tasted  a  meal  since  leaving  Cabul.  Some  had 
infants  a  few  days  old  at  their  breasts,  and  were  unable  to  stand 
without  assistance  ;  some  were  in  a  condition  which  under  ordi- 
nary circumstances  would  have  admitted  of  no  exertion.  Yet 
these  helpless  women,  with  their  young  families,  had  already 
been  obliged  to  rough  it  on  the  backs  of  camels  and  on  the 
tops  of  the  baggage-za&oos ;  those  who  had  a  horse  to  ride,  or 
were  capable  of  sitting  on  one,  were  considered  fortunate.  .  .  . 
The  offer  of  Mohammed  Akbar  Khan  seemed  their  only  chance 
of  preservation ;  yet  it  was  a  matter  of  serious  consideration 
whether  they  were  not  rushing  into  the  very  jaws  of  death  by 
placing  themselves  at  the  mercy  of  a  man  who  had  so  lately 
imbued  his  hands  in  the  blood  of  the  British  envoy,  whom  he 
had  lured  to  destruction  by  similar  professions  of  peace  and 
good-will.  .  .  .  On  the  night  of  the  eighth,  Captain  Sturt,  hus- 
band of  the  daughter  of  Sir  Robert  and  Lady  Sale,  died  of  his 
wounds,  and  a  grave  had  been  hollowed  out  for  him  in  the  snow 
of  the  frozen  mountain.  Overwhelmed  with  their  sorrow,  Mrs. 
Sturt  and  Lady  Sale  heard  almost  with  indifference  that  they 
were  to  be  handed  over  to  the  Afghan  commander." 

"  There  was  but  faint  hope,"  says  Lady  Sale,  "  of  our  ever 
getting  to  Jellalabad,  and  we  followed  the  stream  ;  all  I  person- 
ally know  of  the  affair  is  that  I  was  told  we  were  all  to  go,  that 
we  must  mount  immediately,  and  be  off." 

The  following  day  was  spent  by  the  forlorn  party  in  a 
small  hill  fort,  where  they  found  Pottinger,  George  St. 
Patrick  Lawrence,  and  Captain  Colin  McKenzie,  who  had 
been  surrendered  as  hostages  to  the  enemy.  Rude  and 
rough  as  were  the  accommodations  and  the  fare,  the  small 
dark  hovels  in  which  they  lodged  were  welcomed  in  ex- 
change for  the  terrible  snowy  mountain  passes.  They  cared 
little  for  dense  smoke,  since  it  secured  them  the  blaze  of  a 
wood  fire.  Here  Akbar  Khan  sought  an  interview  with 
Lady  Macnaughten,  and  expressed  regret  for  her  husband's 
death,  saying  that  if  he  could  restore  him  to  life  he  would 
give  his  hand.  This  was  not  probably  hypocrisy.  The  deed 
had  been  done  in  a  moment  of  rage,  and  he  probably  saw 
and  repented  his  blunder. 

But  to  return  to  the  Khyber  Pass  and  those  there  endur- 
ing miseries  of  cold,  fatigue,  and  hunger.  The  European 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  183 

soldiers  were  now  the  only  efficient  troops  left.  The 
Sepoys,  unaccustomed  to  such  a  climate,  had  sunk  under 
its  horrors.  "  Hope,"  said  Lieutenant  Eyre,  "  seemed  to 
have  died  in  every  breast.  The  wildness  of  terror  was 
exhibited  in  every  countenance." 

The  end  was  now  approaching.  In  a  narrow  gorge  as 
the  road  passed  between  two  hills  the  army  was  attacked 
by  a  strong  body  of  Afghans,  who  captured  the  army  chest 
and  such  baggage  as  had  been  preserved.  Only  two  hun- 
dred and  seventy  men,  all  Europeans,  with  a  small  field- 
piece,  forced  their  way  through.  Akbar  proposed  to  them 
to  surrender.  They  refused  indignantly,  and  struggled  on. 

There  were  camp-followers,  however,  who  still  pushed 
onward,  and  impeded  the  speed  of  the  little  party  of  English 
soldiers.  That  night  these  men  tried  to  escape  under  a 
brilliant  moon,  but  had  to  move  so  slowly  that  the  enemy 
was  upon  them  before  morning.  They  had  marched  thirty 
hours  when  they  found  shelter  under  a  ruined  wall. 

Here  Akbar  again  attempted  negotiation,  and  demanded 
General  Elphinstone,  General  Skelton,  and  Captain  John- 
stone  as  hostages  for  the  surrender  of  Jellalabad,  which  was 
held  by  Sir  Robert  Sale.  This  was  not  agreed  to,  but  the 
officers  named  went  to  Akbar's  headquarters  to  arrange 
terms,  when  they  were  seized  as  prisoners.  There  now 
remained  but  twenty  fighting  men,  who  resumed  their  march 
at  nightfall,  being  within  twenty-four  hours  of  Jellalabad. 
One  of  the  officers  had  the  colors  of  his  regiment  fastened 
round  his  body.  By  midday  nearly  every  man  had  been 
wounded.  Twelve  officers  and  a  few  cavalrymen,  all  bleed- 
ing, rode  ahead  of  the  troop,  and  six  of  them  dropped  from 
their  horses  before  reaching  the  last  village  that  separated 
them  from  Jellalabad.  The  remainder  were  treacherously 
assailed  there  while  eating  some  food  which  they  thought 
had  been  given  them  in  compassion.  Two  were  slain  where 
they  sat ;  the  others  reached  their  horses  and  escaped.  All 
perished,  however,  except  one  man,  Dr.  Brydon,  before 
reaching  Jellalabad.  Worn  out  and  wounded,  he  had 
struggled  on  upon  his  jaded  pony  till  the  walls  of  the 


184    ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

fort  appeared  in  sight.  He  was  espied  alone  upon  the 
plain,  and  a  party  was  sent  out  to  bring  him  in,  —  the  sole 
survivor  (not  a  captive)  of  the  forty- five  hundred  men  and 
twelve  thousand  camp-followers  who  had  quitted  the  canton- 
ments of  Cabul  barely  a  week  before. 

Sir  Robert  Sale  refused  to  surrender  the  fortress  of  Jella- 
labad,  though  Akbar  professed  to  consider  Generals  Elphin- 
stone  and  Skelton  as  hostages.  He  said  that  Akbar  had 
done  nothing  to  protect  the  retreating  British  army,  and 
General  Nott,  at  Candahar,  said  the  same. 

Nothing  I  could  say  would  give  an  idea  of  the  feeling 
excited  in  England  when,  many  months  after  these  events, 
the  news  came.  The  English  ministry  had  been  changed. 
Sir  Robert  Peel  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington  were  in  power, 
and  Lord  Ellenborough  had  already  been  sent  out  to  super- 
sede Lord  Auckland  as  Governor-General  of  India.  Lord 
Ellenborough  received  the  news  when  his  vessel  reached 
Madras.  He  was  a  man  of  tremendous  energy,  and  of  such 
vanity  and  eccentricity  that  by  many  he  was  thought  partially 
insane.  How  he  and  the  ministry  of  Sir  Robert  Peel  re- 
paired the  errors  of  Lords  Palmerston  and  Auckland,  and 
of  the  unhappy  General  Elphinstone,  who  lay  dying  in  the 
tents  of  Akbar  Khan,  may  be  told  presently  ;  meantime  we 
will  go  back  to  the  captive  women  and  children. 

Lady  Sale,  wife  of  Sir  Robert  Sale,  has  given  us  the  record 
of  their  experiences,  and  also  Captain  Johnstone  and  Lieu- 
tenant Eyre. 

The  day  after  Lady  Macnaughten  had  had  her  painful 
interview  with  Akbar  Khan,  the  ladies  proceeded  on  their 
journey,  guiding  their  horses  among  heaps  of  corpses  lying 
naked  in  the  pass,  and  sickened  by  the  smell  of  blood. 
Their  destination  was  a  small  fort  in  the  hills,  where  they 
were  received  with  kindness,  and  another  European  officer 
was  added  to  their  party.  Subsequently  an  army  surgeon 
joined  them,  to  their  great  relief,  and  a  day  or  two  after 
General  Elphinstone  and  the  two  other  officers,  who  had 
surrendered,  as  we  have  seen,  when  small  chance  of 
escaping  alive  out  of  the  pass  remained  to  them. 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  185 

Strange  to  say,  the  Afghan  chiefs  were  at  all  times  kind, 
and  sometimes  even  chivalrous,  in  their  attentions  to  their 
prisoners.  Kindness,  too,  was  shown  them  more  than  once 
by  inferiors,  who  remembered  former  kindness  received 
from  Englishmen.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  no  mercy  was 
shown  to  the  wretched  Sepoy  troops  or  to  the  camp-fol- 
lowers. These  could  not  be  made  valuable  as  captives,  and 
the  men,  now  without  officers,  naked,  benumbed,  and  utterly 
defenceless,  wandered  among  the  mountains  in  small  par- 
ties till  they  died,  either  by  the  knives  of  their  enemies  or 
of  cold  and  hunger. 

The  English  prisoners  all  through  their  captivity  respected 
Sunday.  They  had  picked  up  a  pocket-bible  and  prayer- 
book  in  the  pass,  and  one  of  the  gentlemen  read  the  ser- 
vice to  the  rest  every  Sunday  morning.  They  observed  that 
nothing  seemed  so  favorably  to  impress  the  Mohammedans 
around  them  as  any  evidence  of  piety.  They  were  also 
treated,  it  appeared  to  them,  with  more  consideration  and 
respect  on  Sunday  than  on  other  days. 

Wearily  they  journeyed  on,  not  knowing  where  they  were 
being  taken,  —  sometimes  hoping  it  might  be  to  Jellala- 
bad,  to  be  exchanged  for  Dost  Mohammed  and  his  harem  ; 
sometimes  fearing  that  they  might  be  carried  off  into  the 
wilds  of  Turkestan  or  Bokhara. 

With  the  exception  of  Lady  Macnaughten  and  Mrs.  Tre- 
vor, the  ladies  had  lost  all  their  baggage.  Many  had  little 
children  dependent  on  their  care,  who  all  had  to  march 
day  by  day  on  the  backs  of  camels  or  on  horseback,  till 
they  found  an  inhospitable  resting-place  on  the  other  side 
of  the  mountains,  in  a  miserable  little  fort  known  as  Fort 
Baderabad,  which  had  been  built  by  a  relative  of  Akbar 
Khan  as  a  refuge  in  time  of  need  for  his  own  women.  Here 
they  lived  six  months,  and  were  treated  with  kindness. 
There  were  nine  ladies,  twenty  gentlemen,  thirteen  chil- 
dren, seventeen  European  soldiers,  two  soldiers'  wives,  and 
a  child  belonging  to  one  of  them. 

Their  jailer  was  Mirza  Bahoo-ud-Deen  Khan.  The  Mirza 
was  not  a  cruel  man ;  but  it  was  impossible  for  wild  Afghans 


1 86    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

of  the  hills  to  understand  what  were  absolute  necessaries-  of 
life  to  English  ladies  and  their  little  children.  They  suffered 
much  in  that  lonely  fort,  though  there  were  times  even 
there  when  the  children  and  young  officers  enjoyed  them- 
selves ;  and  we  read  of  merry  games,  —  of  snowballing  and 
blind-man's-buff.  They  had  also  two  old  packs  of  cards, 
which  were  a  great  resource  to  many  of  them. 

From  time  to  time  a  little  news  would  reach  them,  — 
guessed  at  rather  than  communicated,  read,  as  they  would 
fancy,  in  the  faces  of  their  guards. 

At  one  time  there  occurred  an  earthquake  which  shook 
down  the  defences  of  Jellalabad,  and  almost  brought  the 
old  fort  where  they  were  imprisoned  about  their  ears.  No 
one  was  seriously  hurt,  but  nearly  one  hundred  shocks 
followed.  In  the  midst  of  the  excitement  that  they  caused, 
General  Elphinstone  died.  He  had  been  suffering  both 
from  gout  and  asthma,  and  a  sense  of  his  own  terrible 
errors  and  shortcomings  could  not  but  prey  upon  his 
mind.  Besides  this  he  was  a  kindly  old  man,  deeply  moved 
by  the  sight  of  the  sufferings  around  him.  They  read  the 
burial  service  reverently  over  him,  and  buried  him  in  a 
lonely  grave  among  the  hills. 

By  degrees  rumors  reached  the  captives  of  the  advance 
of  the  British  forces  as  far  as  Jellalabad.  Their  guards  be- 
came anxious  and  excited.  The  Mirza  requested  a  certifi- 
cate from  the  captives  to  the  effect  that  he  had  treated  them 
with  kindness.  "  We  gladly  complied  with  his  wishes,"  said 
Sir  George  Lawrence,  "as  he  had  deserved  well  of  us  all. 
He  is  an  intelligent  man,  without  the  overweening  conceit 
of  his  countrymen ;  and,  knowing  well  that  the  destruction 
of  our  army  would  one  day  be  avenged,  he  thought  it  would 
be  a  prudent  measure  to  provide  himself  with  a  document 
that  might  in  that  case  be  of  use." 

The  Mirza  was  alive  a  few  years  since,  and  the  precious 
document,  with  its  faded  ink,  has  been,  as  he  foresaw,  of 
immense  use  to  him.  In  his  old  age,  when  he  was  exiled 
from  Cabul,  it  procured  him  a  comfortable  pension  from 
the  British  Government.  He  had  had  the  paper  photo- 


THE    CABUL  MASSACRE.  l8/ 

graphed,  and  kept  it  carefully,  surrounded  with  extracts  from 
printed  books  and  reports  concerning  him.  He  was  a 
favorite  with  Dost  Mohammed,  whose  dangers  he  had  shared 
in  Bokhara,  and  had  always  been  accounted  a  friend  to  Eng- 
lishmen. As  he  grew  old,  his  memory  of  the  events  of  the 
imprisonment  grew  somewhat  clouded;  but  three  things 
stood  out  vividly  in  his  remembrance,  —  the  earthquake,  the 
birth  of  three  little  European  babies,  and  the  wonderful 
treasures  contained  in  Lady  Macnaughten's  boxes ;  out  of 
which,  by  advice  of  some  of  the  officers,  she  presented  him 
two  shawls. 

At  last  news  came  of  the  defeat  of  Akbar  Khan.  "  Then 
the  captives  were  hurried  away  again,  they  knew  not  whither, 
through  ever  ascending  mountain-passes,  under  a  scorching 
sun."  They  were  being  carried  off  to  the  wild,  rugged 
regions  of  the  Indian  Caucasus.  They  were  bestowed  in  a 
miserable  fort  named  Barmecan.  They  were  now  under  the 
charge  of  a  man  named  Mohammed  Akbar,  —  one  of  Akbar 
Khan's  soldiers  of  fortune.  He  had  for  some  time  begun  to 
suspect  that  things  were  wellnigh  hopeless  with  his  master. 
He  was  induced,  by  gradual  and  very  cautious  approaches, 
to  enter  into  negotiations  with  the  prisoners  for  their  release. 
The  English  officers  signed  an  agreement  with  him  to  pay 
him  twenty  thousand  rupees,  and  secure  him  a  pension  of 
one  thousand  rupees  a  month,  together  with  the  protection 
of  the  British  Government,  provided  he  would  escort  them 
all  in  safety  within  the  lines  of  the  British  army.  This 
agreement  did  not  prevent  Mohammed  Akbar  from  helping 
himself  out  of  Lady  Macnaughten's  trunks  to  her  valuable 
shawls  and  jewels. 

He,  however,  set  forward  with  his  prisoners  on  their  way  to 
the  camp  of  General  Pollock,  on  September  n,  1842,  after 
eight  months  of  captivity.  Meantime  Pollock  had  despatched 
a  party  of  Kuzilbashes  (native  irregular  cavalry) ,  with  orders 
to  pursue  the  party  of  captives  to  the  hills,  and  to  recover 
them.  If  all  came  back  in  safety,  each  man  was  to  receive 
four  months'  extra  pay.  They  were  commanded  by  Sir 
Robert  Sale,  and  pushed  on  rapidly  on  the  trail  of  the  cap- 


1 88    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

tives.  Suddenly,  as  they  ascended  the  hills,  they  came  upon 
a  huge  lone  pillar,  which  they  found  to  have  been  erected 
by  Alexander  the  Great  to  commemorate  his  feat  of  having 
crossed  those  mountains. 

At  midday  on  the  i;th  of  September,  1842,  as  the  little 
party  of  captives  stopped  for  food  and  rest,  they  were 
alarmed  by  seeing  horsemen  appear  on  the  crest  of  a  neigh- 
boring hill.  They  were  evidently  native  horsemen;  and 
the  instantaneous  thought  of  the  English  was  that  they 
were  the  soldiers  of  Akbar  Khan,  sent  to  massacre  all  of 
them,  or  at  best  to  hurry  them  beyond  reach  of  their 
own  countrymen.  In  the  midst  of  their  terror  they  espied 
an  English  officer  riding  to  the  front  and  waving  a  white 
handkerchief.  -  It  was  Sir  Robert  Sale,  the  hero  of  Jellala- 
bad.  "  Our  joy,"  says  one  of  the  rescued  prisoners,  "  was 
too  great,  too  overpowering  for  tongue  to  utter." 

On  the  ist  of  October  all  the  party  had  reached  Peshawar. 
Lady  Sale,  Captain  Johnstone,  and  Lieutenant  Eyre  each 
told  the  narrative  of  their  captivity  in  very  interesting  vol- 
umes ;  and  while  the  Duke  of  Wellington  highly  praised  the 
latter,  Lady  Sale's  Journal,  in  1843,  was  m  every  English- 
man's hands. 

"  When  rumors  of  the  perils  of  the  army  at  Cabul  reached 
Calcutta,  in  January,  1842,  there  was  not  a  European  whose 
heart  did  not  beat  and  whose  pulse  did  not  tremble  when  he 
opened  the  letters  brought  him  from  the  frontier.  No  one  who 
dwelt  in  any  part  of  India,"  says  Sir  J.  W.  Kaye,  who  wrote 
a  history  of  this  campaign,  "during  the  early  days  of  1842, 
will  ever  forget  the  eagerness  and  fear  with  which  questions 
were  asked  and  answered,  opinions  interchanged,  rumors  and 
probabilities  weighed,  and  how,  as  the  tragedy  deepened  in 
solemnity,  even  the  most  timid  and  despondent  felt  that  the 
ascertained  reality  far  exceeded  the  miseries  and  horrors  of 
their  imagination." 

The  nearest  post  to  the  Afghan  frontier  was  the  town  and 
fortress  of  Peshawar.  To  Peshawar  the  agreement  signed 
by  General  Elphinstone  with  Akbar  Khan  bound  the  garri- 
son of  the  Afghan  fortress  of  Jellalabad  to  retire.  That 
fortress  was  held  by  Sir  Robert  Sale  with  twenty-five  hun- 


THE    CABUL  MASSACRE.  189 

dred  men,  of  whom  eight  hundred  and  thirty-six  were  Sepoys. 
On  receiving  Akbar  Khan's  summons  to  surrender,  after 
having  ascertained  that  he  had  wholly  failed  to  protect  the 
retreating  English  army,  Sir  Robert  refused  to  be  bound 
by  an  agreement  that  the  Afghan  leader  had  broken,  and 
resolved  to  hold  out  against  the  whole  power  of  the  Afghan 
tribes,  though  he  had  but  seventy  days'  provisions  for  his 
men,  and  twenty-five  for  their  horses.  In  this  determina- 
tion he  had  been  strengthened  by  a  letter  that  was  trans- 
mitted him  from  Lady  Sale,  urging  him  never  for  one 
moment  to  take  into  consideration  her  position,  or  that  of 
their  daughter,  Mrs.  Sturt,  when  the  honor  of  their  country 
was  concerned. 

On  the  i  pth  of  February,  the  same  earthquake  that  shook 
down  the  walls  of  the  hill  fort  in  which  the  captives  were 
confined  destroyed  also  the  defences  of  Jellalabad.  There 
were  breaches  that  a  troop  could  have  marched  through, 
four  abreast.  In  a  few  days,  by  incredible  exertions  on 
the  part  both  of  Europeans  and  Asiatics,  the  damage  was 
repaired,  and  the  fort  was  stronger  than  before. 

Lord  Auckland,  meantime,  was  in  a  state  of  terrible  doubt 
and  indecision.  His  party  had  gone  out  of  power,  and  he 
was  waiting  the  arrival  of  Lord  Ellenborough,  the  new 
Governor-General.  He  could  not  guess  what  the  policy  of 
the  new  Indian  administration,  under  the  direction  of  the 
Duke  of  Wellington  and  Sir  Robert  Peel,  might  prove.  In 
the  uncertainty,  he  ordered  all  available  troops  to  concen- 
trate at  Peshawar.  But  Scinde  and  every  other  Indian 
power  was  restless  and  uneasy,  —  all  ready  to  take  advan- 
tage of  the  disasters  that  had  befallen  the  English  army. 
Lord  Ellenborough,  on  taking  the  reins  of  government, 
decided  that  his  true  policy  would  be  to  withdraw  the 
English  troops  wholly  from  Afghanistan ;  to  proclaim  a 
change  of  policy  which  should  make  the  Indus  the  boundary 
of  British  ambition  in  Northwestern  India ;  to  attempt  no 
further  military  operations,  except  such  as  might  be  neces- 
sary to  withdraw  the  garrisons  in  safety  from  Jellalabad  and 
Candahar,  and  to  abandon  Afghanistan  to  the  Afghans. 


ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

He  fitted  out  two  expeditions,  one  for  the  relief  of  Jella- 
labad,  one  to  relieve  Candahar.  The  Candahar  expedition 
failed ;  but  General  Nott  extricated  himself  and  his  garri- 
son, without  succor,  by  his  own  skill  and  the  bravery  of  his 
tried  soldiers. 

At  Jellalabad  the  relieving  force  came  in  sight  from  the 
fortress  in  the  middle  of  March.  On  April  i  the  garrison 
made  a  sortie.  A  complete  victory  was  gained  ;  two  stand- 
ards that  had  been  taken  in  the  terrible  disasters  of  the 
retreat  were  recovered,  and  four  of  the  cannon.  Pollock, 
victorious  at  Jellalabad,  and  Nott  at  Candahar,  were,  above 
all  things,  anxious  to  be  allowed  to  push  on  to  Cabul  and 
take  vengeance  for  the  massacre.  Lord  Ellenborough  for 
a  long  time  refused  to  sanction  any  forward  march  into  the 
territory  of  Afghanistan,  and  consented  at  last  only  on  con- 
dition that  Nott  and  Pollock  would  fully  understand  two 
things :  First,  that  they  were  acting  on  their  own  respon- 
sibility ;  secondly,  that  if  repulsed  they  could  expect  no 
army  to  come  to  their  aid. 

With  this  understanding,  Pollock  pushed  on.  He  had 
eight  thousand  men  under  his  command,  and  they  forced 
the  first  part  of  the  long  pass  early  in  August.  Soon  all 
the  way  the  troops  trod  on  the  whitened  bones  of  men, 
horses,  and  camels  that  had  perished  the  previous  winter. 
The  pass  was  in  general  about  forty  yards  in  width ;  but  in 
many  places  it  narrowed  to  ten  feet,  and  in  one  place  to 
six  feet,  so  that  the  fall  of  a  baggage-horse  would  there 
have  obstructed  a  whole  army. 

Not  long  after  the  British  left  Cabul,  Shah  Soojah  had 
been  assassinated.  His  body,  stripped  of  its  royal  robes 
and  jewels,  was  flung  into  a  ditch.  Prince  Timour  was 
never  even  thought  of  as  his  successor,  but  for  a  while  the 
crown  was  placed  on  the  head  of  Shah  Soojah's  second  son, 
Fetteh  Jung. 

The  English  army  (Pollock's  and  Nott's  forces  combined) 
entered  Cabul  on  the  i6th  of  September,  1842,  a  few  days 
before  the  recovery  of  the  captives  by  the  horsemen  sent 
after  them  to  the  hills.  It  was  determined  utterly  to 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  191 

destroy  the  large  and  beautiful  Bazaar  of  Cabul  before 
evacuating  the  city.  The  architecture  of  this  place  was 
extraordinarily  beautiful,  and  it  had  been  the  pride  of  the 
Afghans  from  generation  to  generation ;  but  there  the 
bodies  of  Macnaughten  and  Burnes  had  been  exposed  to 
the  contumely  of  Mohammedan  fanatics.  It  was  with  great 
difficulty  that  it  was  laid  waste,  and  its  columns  and  arches 
destroyed.  Pollock  and  Nott  seem  to  have  acted  up  to 
Phil  Sheridan's  maxim,  that  "  you  cannot  make  war  without 
soiling  white  kid  gloves ;  "  and  there  were  many  charges  of 
needless  cruelty  and  devastation  made  against  them  after- 
wards in  the  English  papers.  But  by  Lord  Ellenborough's 
express  orders,  if  the  expedition  proved  successful  it  was  to 
signalize  its  triumph  by  bringing  back  to  India  the  gates  of 
the  idol  temple  at  Somnauth.  These  gates  had  been  cap- 
tured eight  hundred  years  before  by  a  Mohammedan  prince 
who  invaded  India.  He  brought  them  to  Afghanistan  (as 
they  were  very  handsome)  to  adorn  the  tomb  of  some 
Mohammedan  saint  near  Ghuznee.  The  gates  were  taken 
from  the  tomb  of  the  saint  and  lugged  with  great  difficulty 
over  the  mountains,  —  the  proceeding  affording  small  grati- 
fication to  the  Mohammedan  native  soldiers  in  the  English 
army,  who  greatly  outnumbered  the  Hindoos.  However, 
Lord  Ellenborough,  who  loved  to  write  bulletins  in  the 
style  of  Napoleon,  had  the  satisfaction  of  putting  forth  two 
grandiloquent  proclamations  which  the  Duke  of  Wellington 
had  hard  work  in  trying  to  defend  before  Parliament  and 
the  country.  In  private,  the  Duke  spoke  very  freely  of  the 
eccentricities  of  the  Governor- General. 

"  I  told  the  Duke,"  says  Greville,  "that  a  friend  of  mine 
had  seen  a  letter  from  Ellenborough,  in  which  he  gave  an 
account  of  a  review  he  was  going  to  have,  when  he  meant 
to  arrange  the  army  in  the  form  of  a  star,  with  the  artillery 
at  the  point  of  each  ray,  and  a  throne  for  himself  in  the 
centre.  'And  he  ought  to  sit  upon  it  in  a  strait-waist- 
coat ! '  grimly  replied  the  Duke  of  Wellington." 

The  very  day  that  the  army  returned  in  triumph  to 
Peshawar,  news  was  received  of  another  English  triumph, 


192    ENGLAND  IN  THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

—  the  submission  of  the  Chinese  at  the  close  of  the  well- 
fought  but  far-from-creditable  Opium  War.  England, 
however,  had  other  causes  of  quarrel  with  the  Chinese 
Government,  which  up  to  time  of  this  war  had  persisted  in 
treating  all  civilized  nations  as  outside  barbarians,  unworthy 
of  consideration  from  the  Sons  of  Heaven. 

I  remember  when  five  wagon-loads  of  silver  money, 
each  drawn  by  four  horses  and  escorted  by  a  detachment 
of  the  Sixtieth  Regiment,  passed  through  the  streets  of 
London  on  their  way  to  the  Mint.  It  was  the  war  indem- 
nity, of  four  and  a  half  millions  of  pounds  sterling,  paid 
by  the  Chinese  Government. 

English  soldiers  and  sailors  behaved  most  gallantly  in 
this  war;  but  its  immediate  cause  was  the  refusal  of  the 
Chinese  Government  to  permit  opium  to  be  imported, 
declaring  that  it  ruined  the  health  and  morals  of  the 
Chinese  people.  Opium  cannot  be  raised  in  China ;  it  is 
raised  in  India,  and  the  Government  has  the  monopoly  of 
the  opium  factories.  The  poppies  are  grown  by  the  small 
cultivators,  who  always  find  a  market  for  them  at  a  fixed 
rate  in  Government  factories.  Lord  Palmerston  professed 
to  think  that  the  moral  ground  taken  by  the  Chinese 
government  was  a  pretext  for  destroying  British  com- 
merce with  China,  and  injuring  the  revenues  of  the  English 
Government.  The  quarrel  went  on  some  time  before  the 
disputants  had  recourse  to  arms.  The  war  on  the  part  of 
the  English  was  a  succession  of  cheap  victories.  The 
Chinese  fought  bravely,  but  their  guns  were  as  old  as  the 
days  of  Queen  Elizabeth.  At  last  they  asked  for  peace  on 
any  terms.  The  English  demanded  that  Hong- Kong,  a 
small  island,  should  be  ceded  to  them,  and  five  ports  of 
entry  be  assigned  them.  Traffic  was  to  be  opened  to  all 
foreigners,  and  the  English  were  to  treat  with  the  Chinese 
on  equal  terms.  This,  with  the  indemnity  exacted,  pro- 
cured peace.  But  Justin  McCarthy  has  remarked,  when 
speaking  on  this  subject,  "  As  children  say  the  snow  brings 
more  snow,  so  did  this  war  with  China  bring  on  others." 

When  Lady  Sale  and  her  fellow-captives  got  back  safely 


GENERAL   SIR   HENRY  HAV BLOCK. 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  193 

to  Hindoostan,  Dost  Mohammed  was  released  from  his 
captivity.  Lord  Ellenborough  in  a  proclamation  declared 
that  "  to  force  a  sovereign  on  a  reluctant  people  was  as 
inconsistent  with  the  policy  as  it  was  with  the  principles  of 
the  British  Government,"  and  before  long  Dost  Mohammed 
was  restored  to  his  throne.  He  continued  to  be  a  good 
friend  to  the  English.  He  had  seen  their  power,  and 
experienced  their  humanity ;  and  he  made  a  treaty  with 
the  Indian  Government  by  which  he  bound  himself  to  give 
no  ear  to  the  intrigues  of  any  other  foreign  Power. 

It  seems  strange  that  these  terrible  experiences  of  1842 
should  have  been  in  part  repeated,  nearly  a  quarter  of  a 
century  later,  on  the  same  ground,  and  partly  from  the  same 
causes;  for  the  terrible  massacres  of  1841  and  1842  were 
not  the  only  massacres  of  Cabul. 

The  Duke  of  Wellington  ascribed  the  disaster,  whose 
history  I  have  just  narrated,  "  to  the  attempt  to  make  war 
on  a  military  peace  establishment ;  making  war  without  a 
safe  base  of  operations;  carrying  the  native  army  out  of 
India  into  a  strange  and  cold  climate ;  giving  undue  power 
to  political  agents  ;  invading  a  poor  country,  whose  resources 
were  unequal  to  supplying  an  army's  wants ;  want  of  fore- 
thought and.  over-confidence  in  the  Afghans  on  the  part  of 
Sir  William  Macnaughten,  placing  the  magazines,  and  even 
the  treasure,  in  indefensible  places ;  and  great  military 
neglect  and  mismanagement  after  the  outbreak."  But  the 
most  fatal  error  was  in  the  policy  which  induced  the 
English  Government  to  incur  real  perils  to  avoid  uncertain 
dangers,  and  its  endeavoring,  in  the  words  of  Lord  Ellen- 
borough's  proclamation,  "to  force  a  sovereign  on  a  reluctant 
people." 

In  the  advance  under  General  Pollock  a  young  lieu- 
tenant, afterwards  General  Sir  Henry  Havelock  (the  Stone- 
wall Jackson  of  the  English  army),  won  his  first  honors. 

As  to  the  gates  of  Somnauth,  which  the  soldiers  trans- 
ported through  the  Khyber  Pass  to  the  plains  of  Hindoo- 
Stan,  —  to  the  Mohammedans  the  act  was  impious  ;  to  the 
Hindoos  the  restoration  was  ridiculous :  for  the  temple  of 


194    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Somnauth  was  in  ruins,  and  the  ground  it  had  covered  was 
owned  by  Mohammedans. 

To  complete  the  absurdity,  the  gates  proved  not  to  be 
genuine  relics  after  all ! 

There  are  two  episodes  connected  with  this  disastrous 
narrative  which  I  should  like  to  tell  before  concluding  the 
subject.  One  is  the  story  of  Captain  Colin  McKenzie's 
ride,  made  on  parole  to  Jellalabad,  on  a  mission  connected 
with  the  liberation  of  the  prisoners ;  the  other,  the  sad  fate 
of  Captains  Stoddart  and  Conelly,  in  the  hands  of  the  tyrant 
of  Bokhara. 

Captain  McKenzie  was  one  of  Akbar's  hostages.  After 
the  repulse  of  that  leader  from  the  walls  of  Jellalabad, 
great  apprehension  prevailed  among  the  prisoners  in  their 
hill  fort  lest  they  should  be  massacred  for  revenge.  At 
that  time  General  Elphinstone  lay  desperately  ill.  "We 
had  no  medicine  left,"  says  Captain  McKenzie.  "  I  had 
a  lump  of  opium  in  my  pocket,  which  seemed  to  do 
him  some  good ;  but  at  last  it  was  gone,  and  we  had  no 
more."  When  the  General  died,  Akbar  was  a  good  deal 
affected,  regretting  that  he  had  not  sent  him  where  he 
could  obtain  medical  aid ;  and  he  resolved  to  take  the 
advice  of  Major  Pottinger,  and  send  an  officer  on  par- 
ole to  treat  with  General  Pollock  for  the  release  of  the 
prisoners. 

Captain  McKenzie  was  pitched  upon,  under  the  idea  that 
he  had  some  sort  of  ecclesiastical  character,  and  might  be 
the  more  likely  to  return ;  but  few  of  the  Afghan  chiefs 
expected  he  would.  Akbar,  however,  trusted  him.  He 
only  once  asked  him  if  he  intended  to  return,  and  received 
for  answer,  "Are  you  the  son  of  an  Ameer,  and  ask  me, 
an  English  gentleman,  if  I  shall  keep  my  word?"  All 
McKenzie's  fellow-prisoners,  except  Pottinger,  whose  spirit 
never  quailed,  looked  on  him  as  devoted  to  almost  certain 
destruction.  McKenzie  rode  Lady  Sale's  horse,  with  an 
Afghan  saddle.  He  was  placed  under  the  charge  of  a  noted 
robber,  Buttee,  the  thief,  —  a  sort  of  Rob  Roy  in  the  High- 
lands of  Afghanistan.  The  party  consisted  of  McKenzie, 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  195 

two  horsemen  of  Akbar's,  Buttee  and  three  of  his  men,  the 
four  last  on  foot. 

"  Our  road,"  says  the  Captain,  "  lay  for  some  distance  up  the 
bed  of  a  mountain  torrent  which  reached  every  now  and  then 
the  breasts  of  our  horses,  over  huge  bowlders  of  stone  which 
made  it  all  but  impassable,  until  we  reached  a  small  cascade,  up 
which  it  was  impossible  to  go.  The  horsemen  began  to  abuse 
Buttee  for  bringing  them  on  such  a  road ;  he  declared  it  was  a 
very  good  road,  and  told  me  to  dismount  and  follow  him.  We 
went  up  a  goat-path,  where  I  cannot  sufficiently  wonder  at  the 
horses  having  been  able  to  follow.  The  exertion  was  tremen- 
dous. As  soon  as  I  found  myself  alone  with  Buttee,  and  dis- 
covered he  could  speak  Persian,  I  began  to  make  friends  with 
him.  He  abused  the  horsemen  for  a  couple  of  milksops.  He 
himself  was  the  finest  specimen  of  a  wiry  athletic  mountaineer  I 
ever  saw.  He  was  nothing  but  bone  and  muscle,  about  thirty 
years  old,  and  never  appeared  the  least  fatigued  or  out  of  breath 
in  surmounting  hills  to  which  Ben  Lomond  is  a  joke.  In  toiling 
up  he  put  his  matchlock  behind  his  back,  with  the  ends  resting 
on  the  inside  of  his  elbows,  so  that  he  had  no  help  from  his  arms, 
and  often  he  was  singing  a  Pushta  war-song.  At  length  we 
worked  our  way  up  to  the  snow,  which,  owing  to  its  extreme 
slipperiness,  was  more  dangerous  still.  In  spite  of  the  cold,  the 
perspiration  rolled  off  of  us.  Even  the  Afghan  horsemen  said 
they  had  never  seen  such  a  road.  Here  and  there  we  saw  some 
little  mountain  fastness  perched  on  some  bad  eminence,  standing 
in  strong  relief  against  the  sky,  and  which  we  passed  with  as  little 
ado  as  might  be.  At  the  top  of  this  stupendous  pass  we  came 
upon  the  most  magnificent  cedars  and  pines  I  ever  saw,  of  from 
eighteen  to  twenty  feet  in  growth.  At  the  summit  of  the  pass  is 
a  high  pole,  with  a  white  flag  on  top,  in  passing  which  every 
Mohammedan  stroked  his  beard  and  uttered  a  prayer.  Our 
route,  after  descending  the  mountain,  lay  not  far  from  the  pass, 
where,  still  untouched  by  decay,  lay  the  bodies  of  many  of 
my  dear  and  faithful  comrades,  and  where  some  three  months 
previously  I  had  witnessed  the  deep  despair  of  poor  General 
Elphinstone,  when  he  and  his  unhappy  subordinate,  Colonel 
Skelton,  were  entrapped  by  their  treacherous  enemy.  In  the 
uncertainty  that  enveloped  all  things  in  the  future.  I  could  only 
lift  up  my  heart  for  comfort,  support,  and  direction  to  Him 
whose  arm  is  never  shortened  to  help  and  save  those  who  put 
their  trust  in  Him. 

"  Soon,  however,  my  time  for  meditation  was  cut  short ;  I  was 


1 96  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

summoned  to  the  front,  and  we  moved  on  rapidly,  Buttee's 
earnest  desire  being  that  we  should  move  on  fast,  as  we  were 
passing  through  the  region  of  certain  tribes,  from  whose  fury,  he 
frankly  admitted,  he  would  be  unable,  if  I  was  discovered,  to 
protect  me.  Our  road  became  rougher  at  every  step,  lying 
always  through  deep  ravines,  and  mostly  through  the  rough  beds 
of  watercourses. 

"  Day  beginning  to  dawn,  Buttee  mounted  my  horse,  making 
me  ride  behind  him,  with  my  hands  and  face  enveloped  in 
the  folds  of  my  turban  and  sheepskin  cloak,  leaving  my  eyes 
scarcely  as  visible  as  those  of  the  roughest  Skye  terrier.  Of 
course  I  was  smothered,  but  there  was  no  help  for  it,  for  it  was 
necessary  I  should  pass  for  a  small  Chief  of  Peshawar,  who,  be- 
ing sick,  was  being  sent  by  Akbar  under  Buttee's  care  to  his  home. 
Unable  to  help  myself,  or  even  to  hold  on  to  the  rider  before  me, 
while  the  old  horse,  unaccustomed  to  carry  double,  kicked  like 
fury,  every  jolt  on  the  sharp  ridge  of  the  horse's  backbone  made 
me  feel  like  the  man  in  the  Scotch  song  '  who  rode  upon  a  razor.' 
En  route  we  passed  several  Ghiljzees,  whose  inquiries  concerning 
me  Buttee  evaded  by  lying ;  but  eluding  their  dangerous  curios- 
ity was  a  great  grief  to  me,  as,  in  addition  to  the  intolerable  pain 
I  was  enduring,  it  was  necessary  to  muffle  up  every  particle  ot 
my  white  skin,  the  least  appearance  of  which  would  have  been 
my  death-warrant ;  and  keeping  my  wide  Afghan  trousers  from 
riding  up  to  my  knees  was  next  to  impossible.  Some  five  miles 
before  we  reached  Chinghai,  a  fortress  belonging  to  Sir  Fraz 
Khan  (Sir  was  not  a  title,  but  a  name),  to  whom  I  was  to  be 
transferred,  as  we  tried  to  slip  by  a  fortress  belonging  to  a  small 
chief  who  was  so  execrably  diabolical  as  to  be  accounted  a  per- 
fect ogre,  even  by  his  own  people,  we  were  thrown  into  great 
consternation  by  being  challenged,  and  obliged  to  stop.  This 
danger,  however,  we  escaped  ;  but  before  we  were  out  of  that 
chief's  territory  the  horse  that  carried  Buttee  and  myself  fell,  and 
I  tumbled  off  into  the  midst  of  a  crowd  of  ruffians  who  had 
rushed  out  at  the  cry  of  '  Strangers  ! '  Wern  out  with  pain  and 
fatigue,  and  despairing  of  escape,  I  was  on  the  point  of  dropping 
my  disguise  and  meeting  my  fate  wkh  as  much  fortitude  as  I 
could  muster  under  such  appalling  circumstances ;  but  it  was  only 
a  passing  temptation.  By  God's  blessing,  I  did  not  lose  my 
presence  of  mind.  I  kept  my  sheepskin  cloak  wrapped  closely 
round  me,  concealing  my  face,  and  staggered  forward  like  a 
man  worn  down  by  sickness.  One  of  Buttee's  followers  took 
the  hint,  and  caught  me  by  the  arm  as  if  to  assist  me,  reviling  the 
luckless  horse  which  had  played  such  a  trick  on  so  good  a  man." 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  197 

This  was  the  most  terrible  moment  in  this  dreadful  jour- 
ney. The  fortress  of  Sir  Fraz  Khan  was  reached.  Buttee 
sought  an  interview  with  the  chief,  who  consented  to  receive 
and  forward  the  Englishman,  who,  after  terrible  sufferings 
from  cramp  and  thirst  and  heat,  found  himself  in  the 
family  bury  ing- ground,  under  the  shade  of  trees  beside  the. 
murmuring  waters  of  a  fountain,  where  he  lay,  enjoying,  he 
says,  "  the  transition  from  a  real  Papistical  Purgatory  to  a 
Mohammedan  Paradise." 

"  In  the  evening  Buttee  took  an  affectionate  leave  of  me," 
says  the  Captain,  "  evidently  glad  to  be  rid  of  so  unsatisfactory 
a  charge ;  for  although  I  think  the  peculiar  notions  of  his  race 
regarding  the  point  of  honor  would  have  led  him  to  die  in  my 
defence,  he  felt  that  the  life  of  a  true  believer  would  have  been,  in 
that  case,  unworthily  wasted.  Honest  Buttee  (if  I  may  poetically 
call  him  so)  was  a  man  of  extraordinary  intelligence,  and,  like 
most  of  his  countrymen,  who  are  distinguished  for  vigor  of  intel- 
lect, personally  liked  Europeans.  My  guides  were  now  two  men  of 
Sir  Fraz  Khan's  own  clan,  one  of  whom,  Akhoonzadeh,  had  been 
chosen  for  his  known  craft  and  reputed  sanctity,  and  both  for 
their  intimate  connection  with  the  greatest  rascals  in  the  coun- 
try, especially  those  of  the  Black  Tent  Ghiljzees,  several  hordes 
of  whom  were  said  to  lie  on  our  route.  These  are  the  freest  of 
the  mountaineers,  handsome  and  intelligent,  and  acknowledge 
no  authority,  human  or  divine.  They  live  continually  in  their 
tents  of  coarse  black  wool,  and  their  habits  are  purely  pastoral, 
which  signifies,  in  spite  of  poets  and  would-be  philosophers,  a 
state  of  incredible  and  unmitigated  wickedness  and  immorality. 
Subsequently  the  body  of  General  Elphinstone,  sent  down  by 
Akbar  to  Jellalabad  as  a  tardy  act  of  courtesy,  fell  into  their 
hands.  They  beat  and  maltreated  the  guard,  and  the  body,  after 
being  dragged  from  the  coffin  and  treated  with  indignities,  was 
with  difficulty  rescued  from  their  hands.  Some  time  after,  when 
I  again  met  Buttee  he  exhibited  me  to  his  wondering  companions, 
after  telling  them  how  I  had  fallen  off  the  horse  at  Chinghai,  and 
escaped  the  Black  Tent  Ghiljzees,  as  a  wonderful  instance  of  the 
mercy  of  God.  To  which  they  all  replied  by  stroking  their 
beards  and  replying,  '  That  was  indeed  a  great  miracle ! ' 

"  The  heat  of  the  plain  we  crossed  before  reaching  General 
Pollock's  camp,  before  Jellalabad,  was  135°  in  the  shade.  It 
completely  stupefied  me,  and  by  the  time  we  reached  the  outly- 
ing picket,  I  was,  as  we  Scotch  say,  sair  forfoughten.  They 


198    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

would  not  believe  I  was  a  European,  so  black  and  haggard 
had  I  become,  till  I  laughed,  when  the  old  native  officer  at  once 
recognized  the  sahib.  The  news  of  my  arrival  soon  spread 
through  the  camp,  and  I  shall  ever  remember  with  much  pleas- 
ure the  hearty  sympathy  and  genuine  kindness  manifested  by 
every  officer  and  soldier  to  the  best  of  his  ability." 

The  reply  that  he  carried  back  to  Akbar  not  proving 
satisfactory,  he  was  sent  again  to  Jellalabad,  with  letters 
from  Akbar  and  Major  Pottinger,  seven  hours  after  his 
arrival. 

His  second  journey  was  much  less  hazardous  than  the 
first,  as  the  Afghans,  being  aware  of  his  having  returned 
voluntarily,  treated  him  with  respect  and  consideration. 
But  the  excessive  fatigue,  coupled  with  previous  hardships 
and  acute  mental  suffering,  caused  by  the  dreadful  scenes 
of  the  massacre,  brought  on  an  attack  of  typhus  fever  in  its 
most  virulent  form.  Under  this  he  nearly  sank,  and  the 
task  of  undertaking  the  journey  for  the  third  and  last  time 
was  confided  to  another  officer. 

A  few  words  must  suffice  to  tell  the  sad  story  of  Captains 
Stoddart  and  Conolly.  The  former,  who  in  the  year  1839 
had  been  sent  on  a  diplomatic  mission  to  Persia,  was  after- 
wards ordered  to  the  court  of  the  Ameer  of  Bokhara.  This 
potentate  received  him  favorably  at  first,  but  afterwards, 
becoming  suspicious  of  the  English  designs,  he  treated  him 
with  marked  indignity,  and  threw  him  into  prison.  Two 
years  later,  Captain  Conolly  proceeded  to  Bokhara  to 
attempt  his  release,  but  could  only  succeed  in  sharing  his 
sufferings.  The  exiled  Sirdar  of  Herat  had  likewise  been 
imprisoned  by  the  Ameer.  He  succeeded  in  effecting  his 
escape  as  a  melon-seller,  and  offered  to  procure  a  similar 
disguise  for  Captain  Conolly ;  but  the  offer  was  refused,  the 
poor  fellow  feeling  confident  that  he  would  soon  be  set  free 
by  the  intervention  of  the  English  Government.  Alas ! 
the  Ameer  of  Bokhara  had  written,  with  his  own  hand,  a 
letter  to  the  Queen  of  England,  and  the  answer  returned 
was  only  written  by  the  English  Secretary  for  Foreign 
Affairs.  Exasperated  by  what  he  considered  an  insult,  the 


THE   CABUL  MASSACRE.  199 

Ameer  showed  his  wrath  in  ill-usage  of  the  captives.  He 
accused  them  of  being  spies,  and  of  giving  help  to  his 
enemies.  English  experience  in  far-off  mountain  regions 
had  been  too  recent  and  too  disastrous  to  make  the  Indian 
Government  willing  to  follow  up  their  remonstrances  by 
force  of  arms.  Besides,  the  authorities  believed,  or  affected 
to  believe,  that  the  unfortunate  gentlemen  had  exceeded 
their  instructions. 

Dr.  Joseph  Wolff,  the  celebrated  Jewish  traveller  and 
Christian  missionary,  made  his  way,  however,  to  Bokhara, 
under  the  auspices  of  some  English  friends,  in  the  hope  of 
saving  the  unhappy  captives ;  but  he  only  reached  Bokhara 
to  hear  that  they  had  already  been  put  to  death.  The 
moment  and  the  actual  manner  of  their  death  cannot  be 
known  with  certainty,  but  there  is  little  doubt  that  both 
were  executed  the  same  day,  by  order  of  the  Ameer.  The 
journals  of  Conolly  were  recovered,  kept  up  to  an  ad- 
vanced period  of  his  captivity,  and  they  relieve,  so  far, 
our  melancholy  feelings  at  the  fate  that  so  early  befell  these 
two  brave  officers,  by  showing  us  that  the  horrors  of  their 
captivity  were  so  great  that  they  may  have  welcomed  the 
swift  stroke  of  the  executioner. 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

TEN   YEARS, —  1841-1851. 

TX7HEN  the  retirement  of  Lord  Melbourne,  in  1841, 
*  *  took  place,  a  Tory  ministry  came  into  power, 
headed  by  the  Duke  of  Wellington  (who,  however,  declined 
an  office)  and  Sir  Robert  Peel.  The  Queen  had  from  her 
earliest  years  placed  great  confidence  in  the  Duke  of  Wel- 
lington, the  unofficial  adviser  of  the  royal  family  (and 
indeed  of  every  other  person  privileged  to  ask  counsel  of 
him  in  matters  of  domestic  difficulty) .  She  had  a  personal 
prejudice  against  Sir  Robert  Peel;  but  that  soon  yielded 
to  the  high  regard  and  esteem  he  early  acquired  from  her 
husband,  and  nothing  could  have  been  more  harmonious 
than  the  court  and  the  cabinet  up  to  the  time  of  Sir 
Robert's  resignation,  in  1846.  The  cabinet  was  com- 
posed of  very  strong  men.  Some  of  its  junior  members 
have  since  been  among  England's  most  distinguished 
statesmen. 

At  that  time  England  was  much  agitated  about  the 
new  Poor  Law.  A  few  words  of  explanation  may  tell 
what  the  Poor  Laws  of  England  were. 

In  England,  after  the  suppression  of  the  monasteries,  in 
the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century,  the  poor  who  had 
been  fed  around  the  convent  gates  had  no  resource  but 
wandering  from  parish  to  parish  to  get  work,  thieving  or 
begging.  The  case  became  so  bad  that  something  more 
than  punishment  was  needed  ;  and  one  of  Queen  Eliza- 
beth's Parliaments  passed  a  Poor  Law,  by  which  every 
parish  was  obliged  to  assess  itself  for  the  support  of  its 
poor.  This  system  worked  pretty  well  till  after  the  great 
Napoleonic  wars,  when  it  was  found  that  in  some  parishes 


TEN  YEARS,  — 1841-1851.  2OI 

the  farmers  themselves,  burdened  by  excessive  rates,  had 
become  paupers.  When  child-labor  was  called  for  in  the 
factories,  pauper  children  in  large  cities  were  shipped  off 
by  the  barge-load  to  labor  and  die  in  places  where  their 
labor  was  contracted  for;  and  many  farmers  paid  their 
laborers  starvation  wages,  but  made  it  up  by  obtaining 
for  their  families  outdoor  parish  relief.  All  this  and  much 
more  was  represented  to  Parliament  in  1834;  and  the 
New  Poor  Law  Bill  was  passed,  appointing  Poor  Law 
Commissioners.  Outdoor  relief  was  not  to  be  given ;  but 
for  every  four,  five,  or  more  parishes,  a  great  ugly  work- 
house was  to  be  built,  and  any  one  who  applied  for  relief 
or  support  was  to  be  forced  to  go  into  the  "  Union " 
which  held  the  paupers  of  the  parish  to  which  he  belonged. 

The  almshouses  in  England  have  nothing  to  do  with 
workhouses,  —  they  are  the  offspring  of  private  charity : 
little  houses  given  rent  free,  often  with  a  yearly  supply  of 
fuel,  to  old  persons  of  the  class  the  benefactor  has  selected 
to  live  in  them ;  and  before  the  Reformation,  they  were 
expected,  in  return,  to  pray  for  the  peace  of  his  soul. 

The  Poor  Law  Commissioners  in  England  soon  found 
that  to  deny  all  outdoor  relief  entailed  great  hardship  ;  and 
the  law  has  been  practically  so  modified,  in  spite  of  the 
policy  of  making  it  as  hard  upon  the  poor  as  possible,  that 
where  one  is  put  into  the  workhouse,  two  receive  outdoor 
relief  still.  In  1883,  the  whole  population  of  England  and 
Wales  was  about  26,000,000,  of  whom  nearly  a  million  were 
paupers.  The  poor-rate  levied  was  ^15,000,000.  One- 
third  of  this  sum  went  to  support  the  rural  police,  to 
repair  highways,  assist  public  improvements,  etc ;  the  rest 
was  appropriated  to  taking  care  of  the  poor.  ^10,000,000 
($50,000,000)  is  a  large  sum  when  we  consider  the  amount 
of  private  charity  bestowed  by  all  classes  in  England,  and 
eliminate  the  number  of  pauper  criminals  supported  in 
jails,  besides  those  who  endure  their  poverty  in  silent 
hopelessness. 

The  most  hateful  feature  of  the  New  Poor  Law  was  the 
forced  separation  of  husband  and  wife,  parents  and  chil- 


2O2    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

dren.  It  was  wished  to  inspire  an  intense  horror  of  the 
workhouse,  and  so  cut  off  from  the  poor  all  temptation 
to  become  paupers.  At  first  the  operation  of  the  law  was 
very  cruel ;  and  though  since  it  has  been  greatly  modified, 
it  may  in  many  instances  be  cruel  still. 

Here  is  an  account  of  the  working  of  the  Poor  Law, 
drawn  by  no  unfriendly  hand.  The  scene  is  in  a  rural 
district,  where  an  unusually  large  number  of  parishes  were 
combined  in  one  Union.  The  Poor  Law  Commissioners 
and  Guardians  of  the  Poor  had  held  their  meeting,  and  the 
relieving  officer,  with  his  list  of  names,  sets  out  to  dis- 
tribute a  week's  out-door  relief  to  the  expectant  poor. 

"  By  the  conditions  of  his  appointment,  he  must  have  a 
horse  and  chaise.  The  contractor  for  bread  is  bound  to 
deliver  it  at  the  house  of  the  pauper.  He  must,  therefore, 
provide  man  and  horse,  and  they  accompany  the  relieving 
officer.  They  arrive  at  the  first  hamlet  on  the  route,  and 
stop  at  a  cottage  door. 

"  Round  it  and  within,  the  destitute  poor  of  the  parish  are 
assembled.  Each  receives  his  allowance  of  money  or  bread. 
But  a  group  has  collected  round  the  door,  whose  names  are 
not  on  the  relief  list.  One  woman  tells  the  relieving  officer 
that  her  husband  is  ill  with  fever,  and  her  children  are  without 
food.  He  knows  the  family.  He  hastens  down  the  lane  and 
across  the  field,  and  enters  the  cottage.  The  man  is  really  ill, 
and  there  are  evident  signs  of  destitution.  A  written  order  is 
given  to  the  medical  officer  to  attend  the  case,  and  necessary 
'relief  is  given.  The  next  man  who  approaches  the  officer,  with 
an  air  of  overbearing  insolence  or  of  fawning  humility,  is  also 
an  applicant.  He  is  known  at  the  village  beer-shop,  and  by  the 
farmer  as  a  man  who  can  work  and  will  not.  He  is  the  last 
man  employed  in  the  parish.  His  hovel  is  visited  ;  it  is  a 
scene  of  squalid  misery.  What  is  to  be  done  ?  He  may  be 
relieved  temporarily  with  bread,  or  admitted  to  the  workhouse 
of  the  Union,  or  he  is  directed  to  attend  the  Board.  The 
relieving  officer  then  proceeds  to  his  next  station.  Here  a 
large  supply  of  bread  awaits  him,  for  he  is  now  in  a  populous 
parish.  The  poor  of  the  parish  are  assembled  at  the  church 
door,  and  the  relief  is  given  in  the  vestry  room.  Then  he 
rides  to  the  cottages  of  the  sick  and  aged,  and  again  continues 
his  route.  The  laborer  in  the  fields  hails  him,  and  tells  of  some 


TEN   YEARS,  — 1841-1851  2  03 

solitary  person  who  is  without  medical  aid.  A  boy  sits  on  a 
stile  waiting  for  him,  to  beg  him  to  come  and  see  his  mother; 
the  farmer's  man,  on  the  farmer's  horse,  is  sent  to  bring  his 
news  of  disease,  destitution,  and  death.  He  completes  his 
day's  journey  before  the  evening.  To-morrow  another  route 
is  taken.  And  thus  he  proceeds  from  day  to  day,  and  from 
month  to  month,  through  summers  heat  and  winter's  cold." 

The  best  part  of  the  system  is  the  certainty  the  poor 
have  of  good  medical  attendance ;  its  worst  feature  is  the 
severing  of  domestic  ties  when  families  are  forced  to  go 
into  the  workhouse,  if  they  are  people  who  retain  some 
self-respect.  An  English  laborer's  wages  range  from  nine 
shillings  ($2.18)  a  week  to  fifteen  shillings.  To  break 
down  or  to  lose  his  work,  if  only  for  a  week,  is  destitution. 

"  If  he  applies  in  health  and  strength  to  the  parish,  there  is 
no  alternative  ;  he  has  to  break  up  his  home,  and  go  into  the 
Union.  He  passes  into  the  men's  hall,  where  he  associates 
with  the  profligate,  the  tramp,  and  the  jail-bird  ;  his  wife  is 
sent  to  the  women's  ward,  where  the  worst  class  of  women  in 
the  surrounding  parishes  are  her  associates.  The  children, 
possibly,  are  better  off;  for,  though  all  brightness  in  their 
young  lives  is  at  an  end,  they  are  under  school  discipline." 

The  Reform  Bill  having  increased  enormously  the  influ- 
ence of  the  great  manufacturing  class  in  the  Reformed 
Parliament,  by  giving  members  to  between  twenty  and 
thirty  large  manufacturing  cities,  a  struggle  ensued  be- 
tween the  inhabitants  of  the  country  and  the  population 
of  large  towns,  —  the  industrials  in  factories,  who  wanted 
cheap  bread,  and  the  farmers,  who  wished  their  products 
to  have  protection.  It  was  this  Parliamentary  agitation 
that  succeeded  that  for  Reform.  During  the  early  years 
of  Queen  Victoria,  the  subject  was  agitated  with  the  utmost 
energy,  though,  at  first,  Mr.  Villiers'  annual  motion  on  the 
subject  was  treated  with  contempt  and  even  ridicule.  But 
by  1840,  documents,  speeches,  public  meetings,  and 
pamphlets,  all  under  the  superintendence  of  the  Anti-Corn- 
Law  League,  led  by  Mr.  Cobden  and  Mr.  Bright,  had 


2O4    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

brought  the  subject  prominently  before  Parliament  and  the 
country.  The  cause  had  also  its  poet,  Ebenezer  Elliott, 
who  wrote  "  Corn  Law  Rhymes." 

In  early  times,  it  was  against  the  law  to  export  wheat 
from  England.  The  wheat  grown  at  home  was  kept  at 
home  for  the  support  of  the  English  population.  In 
Charles  II. 's  time,  an  enormous  duty  was  imposed  on 
foreign  grain,  so  great  that  it  amounted  to  a  prohibition. 

After  the  great  Napoleonic  wars  were  over,  in  1815, 
England  again  endeavored  to  protect  agricultural  interests 
by  prohibiting  the  importation  of  foreign  grain.  It  was 
made  unlawful  to  bring  foreign  wheat  into  England  until 
English  wheat  had  reached  famine  prices ;  that  is,  eighty 
shillings  a  quarter  (about  $2.50  a  bushel).  A  great  deal  of 
popular  disturbance  succeeded  the  passage  of  this  Act, 
which  made  bread  very  dear  in  England,  and  in  1828 
there  was  adopted  a  "  sliding  scale," —  a  curious  commercial 
see-saw.  When  the  price  of  wheat1  was  high,  the  duty 
became  low ;  when  wheat  was  low,  then  the  duty  became 
high.  It  was  said  that  to  take  off  the  duty  on  imported 
wheat  would  impoverish  English  landlords  and  bear  hardly 
on  the  interests  of  those  engaged  in  agriculture.  Expe- 
rience seems  to  prove  that  it  has  done  so.  One  effect  has 
been  that  nearly  all  the  village  commons,  where  the  poor, 
in  my  young  days,  used  to  pasture  their  cows,  their  don- 
keys, and  their  geese,  in  common,  have  been  enclosed  and 
brought  under  cultivation,  while  the  rents  of  the  land- 
owners have,  in  some  parts,  dwindled  to  one-fourth  of  their 
value  twenty-five  years  ago. 

When  Sir  Robert  Peel  and  his  ministry  came  into  power, 
the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws  was  being  agitated  throughout 
England ;  but  it  was  not  a  popular  measure  with  statesmen. 
Almost  all  candidates  for  seats  in  the  House  of  Commons, 

1  In  the  speech  of  Englishmen,  "  corn  "  means  "  wheat."  It  is  very 
hard  for  a  person  accustomed  to  English  ways  of  speaking  to  accus- 
tom himself  to  say,  on  arriving  in  the  United  States,  "  wheat-field," 
instead  of  "corn-field,"  —  "waving  wheat,"  instead  of  "waving 
corn." 


TEN  YEARS,  — 1841-1851.  2O$ 

even  Liberals,  repudiated  the  idea  of  having  anything  to  do 
with  it.  But  Sir  Robert  Peel  had  always  been  in  favor  of  a 
modification  of  the  Corn  Laws,  and,  as  a  manufacturer 
himself,  was  willing  to  go  further  in  the  cause  than  Lord 
John  Russell  (the  son  of  a  great  landowner)  would  venture 
to  do.  In  1845,  when  it  became  certain  that  a  famine  was 
impending  in  Ireland,  Sir  Robert  came  boldly  forward  with 
a  measure  for  Corn  Law  repeal,  which  may  be  said  to 
have  taken  away  the  breath  of  his  friends  in  Parliament 
and  in  the  country.  Of  the  scene  that  in  the  House  of 
Commons  followed  his  introduction  of  this  bill  I  will  speak 
hereafter;  it  forms  a  striking  episode  in  the  history  of 
Lord  Beaconsfield  (Mr.  Disraeli).  The  bill  advocated  by 
the  Government  was  passed  by  a  majority  of  ninety-eight, 
the  Irish  members  voting  with  Peel's  party,  and  the  meas- 
ure went  up  to  the  House  of  Lords,  where  it  passed 
speedily.  The  prospect  of  an  Irish  famine  had  made  a 
great  change  in  public  opinion ;  Macaulay,  for  instance, 
was  heart  and  soul  for  a  bill  he  had  been  at  pains  to  refuse 
to  favor  four  years  before. 

The  howl  of  indignation  against  Peel  the  traitor  —  the 
betrayer  —  is  now  too  strange  to  realize.  I  saw  it,  —  or, 
rather,  heard  it,  —  and  marvelled  at  its  fury.  It  was 
worse  than  the  excitement  seventeen  years  before,  when  he 
abandoned  what  was  then  called  the  "  Protestant "  cause, 
in  favor  of  Catholic  Emancipation.  The  landed  interest, 
however,  which  he  deserted,  had  its  revenge  ;  it  coalesced 
with  the  Irish  members.  In  less  than  a  month  after  his 
triumph,  Peel  ceased  to  have  a  Parliamentary  majority, 
and  his  ministry  resigned.  "On  the  day  on  which  the 
falling  minister  announced  the  dissolution  of  his  Govern- 
ment he  received  a  despatch  from  Washington,  announc- 
ing that  the  dispute  concerning  the  boundary  in  Oregon 
between  the  British  dominions  and  the  United  States  had 
been  satisfactorily  settled." 

That  dispute  had  been  a  warm  one,  and  at  one  time 
seemed  to  threaten  fratricidal  war. 


2O6    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  Peel  was  never  so  popular  or  so  respected  as  during  the  four 
years  after  his  fall  from  power.  He  had  no  desire  to  return  to 
office,  and  when  he  resigned  he  is  said  to  have  implored  the 
Queen  never  again  to  require  him  to  serve  her  as  her  minister. 
He  wrote  to  Lord  Hardinge  a  few  days  after  his  fall,  '  I  have 
every  disposition  to  forgive  my  enemies  for  having  conferred  on 
me  the  blessing  of  a  loss  of  power; '  and  there  is  no  doubt  that 
the  feeling  was  perfectly  sincere." 

When  his  ministry  had  come  into  office,  in  1841,  it  had 
inherited  many  difficulties.  The  foreign  policy  of  Lord 
Palmerston  had  been  left  in  confusion.  British  policy  in 
Afghanistan  had  to  be  reversed,  and  England  was  involved 
in  the  imbroglio  of  the  Eastern  Question.  Mehemet  Ali, 
the  Macedonian  soldier  of  fortune,  who  had  become  ruler 
of  Egypt  by  consent  of  his  suzerain,  the  wicked,  cruel, 
energetic  Mahomet,  last  Sultan  of  the  old  school,  was  in 
rebellion.  The  Russian  Emperor  had  marched  an  army  to 
assist  the  Sultan.  Ibrahim  Pasha,  Mehemet's  brilliant  son, 
was  stopped  after  the  battle  of  Konieh,  in  1832,  when  pre- 
paring to  march  on  Constantinople,  by  the  intervention 
of  the  European  Powers,  and  France  and  England  were 
engaged  in  a  diplomatic  war,  which  threatened  to  become 
something  worse,  over  the  interests  of  the  ruler  of  Egypt, 
whom  France  looked  on  as  her  protege,  and  the  interests  of 
the  Sultan,  which  England  always  systematically  maintained. 
Lord  Palmerston  won  the  victory.  The  interests  of  Me- 
hemet were  sacrificed  to  preserve  the  balance  of  power 
in  Europe,  and  Ibrahim  Pasha1  was  driven  out  of  Syria, 
his  expulsion  being  precipitated  by  the  brilliant  capture  of 
his  stronghold  of  St.  Jean  d'Acre  by  Admiral  Sir  Charles 
Napier. 

Sir  Robert  Peel  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington  also  found 
themselves  with  another  war  in  India  upon  their  hands. 

1  Some  years  after,  on  entering  a  shop  in  Oxford  Street,  whence  a 
carriage  with  a  stout  gentleman  in  it  was  just  driving  away,  my  mother 
and  I  were  met  by  the  proprietor  with,  "  Oh  !  ladies,  I  am  sorry  you 
did  not  come  in  a  few  moments  sooner.  That  there  gentleman  as  has 
just  drove  away  was  Abraham  Parker." 


TEN  YEARS,  — 184.1-1851.  2O? 

Generals  Pollock  and  Nott,  having  punished  the  inhabit- 
ants of  Cabul  for  their  share  in  the  atrocities  of  1841,  and 
the  captive  ladies  and  children  being  restored  to  their 
friends,  Dost  Mohammed  returned  to  his  own  people,  who 
received  him  joyfully ;  and  as  long  as  he  lived  he  was  the 
fast  friend  of  his  old  enemies,  the  English,  who  never 
again  attempted  to  interfere  with  him. 

On  both  sides  of  the  Indus  towards  its  mouths  lies  the 
great  and  fertile  country  of  Scinde.  Northeast  of  Scinde 
lies  the  Punjaub,  and  between  the  Punjaub  and  British 
India  lay,  in  1 840,  the  little  country  of  Gwalior. 

Now,  to  bring  British  India  up  to  the  mountains  and  the 
Indus,  and  to  give  a  safe  frontier  to  her  peninsula,  it  was 
necessary  she  should  own,  or  at  least  influence,  Scinde  and 
the  Punjaub ;  and  to  get  at  the  Punjaub  she  had  to  have 
Gwalior. 

I  am  not  concerned  to  defend  the  way  the  English  Gov- 
ernment and  the  East  India  Company  acted  in  this  matter. 
Their  policy  was  excellent ;  their  political  morality,  can  only 
offer  "  necessity,  the  tyrant's  plea,"  in  excuse.  Had  there 
been  strong  men  at  the  head  of  the  Government  in  Scinde 
or  in  the  Punjaub,  the  Company  and  the  Government  might 
have  made  alliances  with  them  which  would  have  answered 
their  purpose  ;  but  there  was  no  strong  man,  and  no  govern- 
ment worthy  of  the  name,  in  either  country,  and  a  different 
line  of  policy  was  pursued. 

Scinde  at  that  time  was  very  much  like  what  England 
might  have  been  under  the  Normans  if  the  feudal  barons 
had  had  no  king  over  them.  There  were  the  native  inhab- 
itants, a  downtrodden  race ;  the  Ameers,  who  were  exact 
counterparts  of  Norman  barons  or  German  Freiherren ;  and 
their  men-at-arms,  the  Belooches,  whom  they  kept  in  their 
pay  to  oppress  the  people. 

The  comparison  between  Ameers  and  Normans,  Scindians 
and  Saxons,  extends  even  to  their  forest  laws.  The 
Ameers,  like  the  barons,  spent  their  time  in  hunting,  or  in 
the  chase,  and  the  banks  of  the  Indus,  in  every  way  suitable 
for  commercial  purposes,  were  kept  covered  with  jungle, 


2O8    ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

that  the  lords  —  the  Ameers — might  there  find  good  hunt- 
ing-grounds. When  the  English  marched  their  army  into 
Afghanistan  to  restore  Shah  Soojah,  and,  still  more,  when 
they  marched  another  army  to  avenge  the  disasters  of  the 
first,  they  forced  the  reluctant  Ameers  of  Scinde  to  grant  a 
passage  to  their  troops,  and  they  insisted  on  a  treaty  which 
would  let  them  send  trading  vessels  up  the  Indus.  "  All  is 
lost,"  said  one  of  the  Ameers,  as  he  signed  this  treaty; 
"  the  English  will  soon  have  the  river."  Bit  by  bit  the 
English  encroached  on  the  prerogatives  of  the  Ameers,  and 
more  and  more  these  proud  barons  hated  and  mistrusted 
them.  Lord  Ellenborough,  who  had  a  natural  taste  for  war, 
and  real  military  foresight,  determined  to  take  advantage  of 
any  pretext  that  might  offer  for  turning  the  Ameers  into 
open  enemies,  and  then  defeating  them.  It  was  the  old 
story  of  the  wolf  and  the  lamb,  only  the  Ameers  were  by 
no  means  lambs,  but  fierce  tiger-cubs.  With  a  view  to  a 
possible  war  with  these  bold  chiefs,  Sir  Charles  Napier,  the 
general,  was  sent  to  Scinde  to  take  command  of  the  English 
army,  of  which  every  regiment  was  Sepoy,  except  the 
Twenty-second  Queen's  Infantry.  This  regiment  was  com- 
posed mostly  of  Irishmen,  who  in  this  campaign  performed 
prodigies  of  valor. 

The  Napiers  were  a  race  endowed  with  brilliant  qualities, 
but  of  uncertain  tempers  and  many  eccentricities.  They 
were  at  once  tender  and  vindictive,  loving  and  fierce,  faith- 
ful and  capricious,  great  in  great  things,  and  in  little  ones 
so  irritable  and  unreasonable  as  to  be  small.  As  a  general 
of  genius  and  resources,  the  Duke  of  Wellington  considered 
Sir  Charles  Napier  as  second  only  to  himself. 

One  of  the  most  brilliant  episodes  in  Anglo-Indian  his- 
tory relates  how  Sir  Charles  Napier  pushed  a  little  party 
eight  days'  journey  through  a  desert  to  the  chief  stronghold 
of  one  of  the  principal  Ameers. 

"  The  wells  on  the  way  to  it,"  says  Alison,  "  were  all  dry,  and 
water  had  to  be  carried  on  camels'  backs.  To  this  fortress  in 
this  dry  and  untrodden  solitude,  the  Beloochee  forces  were 
reported  by  the  scouts  to  have  retired,  to  the  number  of 


TEN  YEARS,  —  1811-1861.  209 

twenty  thousand  men  ;  and  there,  surrounded  by  the  desert, 
and  protected  by  its  hardships,  were  prepared  to  make  a  stand. 
The  march  was  difficult  beyond  description.  The  camels  gave 
out,  and  the  indefatigable  Irish  soldiers  of  the  Twenty-second 
dragged  the  guns.  On  reaching  the  fortress,  where  were  stored 
vast  quantities  of  grain  and  ammunition,  it  was  found  to  have 
been  deserted  the  night  before.  Napier  and  his  little  band  blew 
it  up,  and  then,  by  another  route,  regained  their  main  body." 

Hyderabad  was  the  capital  of  Scinde,  and  in  it  Sir  James 
Outram,  the  English  Resident,  had  been  suddenly  attacked, 
—  much  as  Sir  Alexander  Burnes  had  been  at  Cabul ;  but 
Outram  defended  himself  with  great  spirit,  and  finally  got 
off  to  the  English  ships  lying  in  the  Indus,  on  the  left  bank 
of  which  is  Hyderabad. 

After  this  followed  the  battle  of  Meanee.  Napier  had 
four  hundred  Irishmen  of  the  Twenty-second,  and  twenty- 
two  hundred  Sepoys  and  Beloochees.  With  these  he  fought 
twenty-two  thousand  under  the  Ameers,  —  posted  in  an  ex- 
traordinarily strong  position,  but  with  too  narrow  a  front, 
or  they  might  have  surrounded  the  little  band  who  attacked 
them.  The  English  officers  everywhere  exposed  themselves, 
and  when  the  day  was  won,  after  a  great  deal  of  hard  hand- 
to-hand  Homeric  fighting,  six  officers  had  been  killed  and 
fourteen  wounded. 

The  battle  took  place  not  far  from  Hyderabad.  The 
next  morning  the  city  was  surrounded,  and  six  Ameers  came 
into  camp  and  laid  their  swords  at  Sir  Charles's  feet.  The 
swords  had  their  hilts  studded  with  diamonds  and  other 
jewels ;  but  Sir  Charles  returned  them  to  their  owners,  say- 
ing, that  "  though  their  misfortunes  had  been  great,  they 
were  of  their  own  creation ;  and,  feeling  them  to  be  great, 
I  gave  them  back  their  swords." 

Great  was  the  joy  of  the  native  population  of  Scinde  when 
the  Ameers,  their  oppressors,  were  defeated,  and  the  coun- 
try fell  into  the  hands  of  the  English  ;  but  the  Ameers  were 
not  wholly  conquered.  They  still  had  a  large  force  under 
their  command.  Napier  had  been  reinforced,  and  a  month 
after  the  battle  of  Meanee  he  fought  the  battle  of  Hydera- 


2IO    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

bad,  which  he  won,  though  for  some  hours  the  victory  was 
doubtful.  One  body  of  irregular  cavalry  pursued  the  enemy 
forty  miles,  and  the  heat  was  no0  in  the  shade. 

The  Sepoys,  though  their  deeds  in  the  Mutiny,  thirteen 
years  later,  were  so  horrible,  were  the  brave  and  loving  com- 
rades of  the  gallant  Irishmen  of  the  Twenty-second.  It 
was  after  this  battle  that,  almost  maddened  by  heat  and 
thirst,  a  party  of  Sepoys  beheld  a  boy  bringing  some  skins 
of  water.  As  they  rushed  at  him  with  frantic  cries,  there 
appeared  six  stragglers  from  the  Twenty-second  Regiment. 
At  once  the  generous  Hindoos  drew  their  own  hands  from 
the  skins,  forgot  their  own  sufferings,  and  gave  drink  to  the 
fainting  Europeans.  Then  they  all  moved  on,  the  Sepoys 
carrying  the  Irishmen's  guns,  patting  them  on  the  back,  and 
encouraging  them.  But  the  poor  fellows  were  soon  found 
to  be  severely  wounded.  Expecting  there  would  be  more 
fighting-work  to  do,  they  had  struggled  on  to  take  their  part 
in  it,  through  heat  and  thirst  and  pain.  Sir  Charles  records 
this  incident  in  his  journal.  It  was  at  this  time  that  he  sent 
his  celebrated  despatch,  "  Peccavi"  —  I  have  Scinde. 

Scinde  was  annexed  to  British  India,  —  not  wholly  by 
fair  play  towards  the  Ameers,  but  to  the  great  satisfaction 
of  its  other  inhabitants.  Instantly  the  rivers  were  opened 
to  commerce,  and  slavery  and  the  slave-trade  put  a  stop  to 
by  Lord  Ellenborough,  who  then  turned  his  attention  to 
the  Punjaub. 

The  best  proof  that  the  inhabitants  of  Scinde  appreciated 
the  blessings  of  their  change  of  government  is  that  the 
country  remained  faithful  to  the  English  through  all  the 
troubles  of  1857. 

At  one  period  the  Punjaub  had  paid  tribute  to  the  Afghan 
ruler  at  Cabul ;  but  that  was  done  away  with  by  its  great 
chief,  Runjeet  Singh,  the  faithful  friend  of  the  English.  He 
had  lent  them  his  assistance  in  their  advance  on  Cabul,  but 
he  did  not  live  to  know  their  terrible  discomfiture.  After 
his  death  his  power  passed  from  one  weak  hand  to  another, 
until  at  last  his  inheritance  fell  to  a  girl-widow  of  thirteen, 
and  her  adopted  son. 


TEN   YEARS,  — 1841-1851.  211 

All  kinds  of  intrigues  against  the  English  were  going  on 
at  the  court  of  Lahore,  and  Lord  Ellenborough  resolved,  as 
soon  as  circumstances  would  permit,  to  annex  the  Punjaub. 
The  most  powerful  body  of  men  in  that  country  were  the 
Sikhs.  The  word  "  Sikh  "  means  disciple.  They  were  not 
Mohammedans,  they  were  not  Hindoos.  They  adhered  to 
the  faith  taught  them  by  a  religious  teacher  called  Nanek, 
who  lived  about  1469  ;  and  his  teachings  closely  resembled 
those  that  Moses  gave  the  Jews.  They  held  the  unity  of 
God,  the  equality  of  all  men  in  the  sight  of  Heaven,  and 
inculcated  good-will  to  men.  They  were  perhaps  the 
most  splendid  horsemen  in  the  world.  They  had  main- 
tained their  independence  for  four  centuries,  till,  early  in 
the  nineteenth,  they  acknowledged  as  their  ruler  Runjeet 
Singh ;  but  when  they  discovered  that  British  influence 
was  to  be  paramount  in  the  Punjaub,  they  resolved  to  be 
independent  once  more. 

Lord  Ellenborough,  foreseeing  that  the  Sikhs  were  not 
going  to  take  his  annexation  of  Gwalior,  and  his  intentions 
towards  the  Punjaub,  with  indifference,  was  massing  troops, 
to  be  in  readiness  when  a  Sikh  war  should  break  out,  when 
he  suddenly  found  himself  recalled  by  the  Home  Govern- 
ment. He  had  transgressed  the  rule  given  by  Talleyrand, 
"  Et  surtout  point  de  zele."  He  had  been  very  zealous. 
He  had  an  especial  love  for  military  enterprises,  and  his 
warlike  preparations  had  alarmed  John  Company.  When 
the  Directors  found  that  he  had  made  a  contract  for  the 
purchase  of  thirteen  hundred  draught-horses  in  Australia,  as 
a  preparation  for  a  Sikh  war,  their  patience  was  exhausted, 
and  he  was  summarily  recalled. 

Sir  Robert  Peel  and  the  Duke  of  Wellington  did  not 
approve  of  this  dismissal,  but  they  acquiesced  in  it.  They 
appointed  Sir  Henry  Hardinge  Governor-General,  —  a  man 
who  had  brilliantly  served  his  country,  under  Wellington,  in 
the  Peninsula,  where  he  had  lost  an  arm  in  the  service.  He 
had  married  a  daughter  of  Lord  Castlereagh. 

When  Sir  Henry  reached  India,  in  1844,  he  found  his 
Government  in  a  state  of  profound  tranquillity,  —  only  a  few 


212    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

robber  chiefs  infested  the  hills.  He  came  out  instructed 
to  observe,  above  all  things,  a  policy  of  peace,  and  not  only 
to  abstain  from  any  hostile  act  against  the  powerful  Sikh 
confederacy,  but  to  avoid  anything  that  might  give  them 
umbrage,  however  unreasonable. 

With  Sir  Henry  was  associated  Sir  Hugh  Gough,  as  com- 
mander-in-chief  of  the  armies  of  India.  Sir  Hugh  was  an 
Irishman,  of  good  family,  from  Tipperary.  He  had  seen 
much  service  in  India,  and  also  in  China.  "  Generous  and 
warm-hearted,"  says  Alison,  writing  before  his  death,  "  he 
has  all  the  affection  of  disposition  which  characterizes  the 
country  of  his  birth,  and  his  personal  influence  is  much 
enhanced  by  a  figure,  which,  tall  and  commanding  even  in 
advanced  life,  bespeaks  the  hero." 

As  Sir  Henry  Hardinge  came  out  to  India  with  the 
strictest  possible  instructions  to  reverse  the  policy  of  Lord 
Ellenborough,  and  avoid  every  occasion  of  offending  the 
Sikhs,  he  made  no  effort  to  concentrate  British  troops  along 
the  bank  of  the  Sutlej,  —  that  tributary  of  the  Indus  which 
then  formed  the  northwestern  boundary  of  British  India. 
The  Asiatic  mind  never  conceives  that  any  motive  but  fear 
can  prevent  an  enemy  or  a  lukewarm  friend  from  taking  an 
advantage ;  and  the  peace  policy,  which  succeeded  the 
vigorous  measures  of  Lord  Ellenborough  was  set  down  by 
the  Sikhs  to  dread  of  their  warlike  prowess.  The  Afghans 
had  successfully  resisted  the  British  :  why  not  the  Sikhs  ?  — 
a  race  no  less  brave  and  warlike,  well  disciplined,  and 
admirably  provided  with  artillery. 

At  Lahore,  the  capital  of  the  Punjaub,  the  Maranee  (or 
little  girl-widow)  was  greatly  frightened  by  an  insurrection  of 
her  Sikh  troops,  who  demanded  to  be  led  at  once  across  the 
Sutlej,  to  drive  back  the  British  and  pursue  their  advantage, 
—  it  might  be  to  the  conquest  of  all  India.  They  obtained 
permission  from  the  Maranee,  and  advanced,  sixty  thousand 
strong,  to  the  banks  of  the  Sutlej. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  rules  of  warfare  demanded  the 
concentration  of  English  troops,  ready  to  oppose  the  Sikh 
army  if  it  should  cross  the  river ;  but  Sir  Henry  Hardinge 


TEN  YEARS,  — 18^1-1851.  21$ 

felt  his  hands  tied  by  the  instructions  received  from  his 
Directors.  He  believed  himself  ordered  to  give  no  provo- 
cation, but  to  wait  till  he  was  attacked  before  making  any 
military  preparations. 

Exultant  at  what  they  attributed  to  fear,  the  Sikh  army 
crossed  the  Sutlej,  and  established  themselves  on  the  British 
side  of  the  river.  Hardinge  and  Gough  hurried  up  their 
scattered  troops  to  meet  the  danger.  "  It  was,"  as  Sir 
Charles  Napier  said  in  a  private  letter,  "  twenty  thousand 
against  six  thousand ;  and  should  the  six  thousand  flinch 
!  "  But  the  six  thousand  did  not  flinch,  nor  their  gen- 
erals. Sir  Henry  Hardinge,  as  Governor-General,  was  Gough's 
superior  officer ;  but  he  resigned  that  rank,  and  placed  him- 
self as  second  in  command  under  Sir  Hugh's  orders.  By 
hurrying  up  reinforcements,  the  men  marching  six-and- 
twenty  miles  a  day,  Gough  and  Hardinge  collected  about 
fourteen  thousand  by  December  17,  1845,  the  day  of  the 
battle  of  Moodkee. 

The  victory  was  gained ;  but  the  English  loss  was  terrible, 
especially  in  officers.  Among  those  who  fell  was  Sir  Robert 
Sale,  the  hero  of  Jellalabad.  The  Sikhs  are  admirable 
fighters,  and  have  been  ever  since  the  close  of  these  wars 
invaluable  as  horsemen  in  the  British  army.  They  did  not 
after  their  defeat  recross  the  river;  they  retreated  to  an 
intrenched  camp  they  had  formed  at  a  place  called  Feroze- 
shah.  There  the  two  Generals  attacked  them,  four  days  after 
the  battle  of  Moodkee.  The  Sikh  artillery  was  heavier  than 
any  the  British  had  been  able  to  bring  up,  and  the  attack 
under  other  circumstances  would  have  been  deemed  des- 
perate. It  achieved  no  decisive  advantage. 

"  Night  came  on,  with  no  relief  for  the  wounded,  no  food  for 
the  wearied,  no  respite  for  the  combatants  ;  side  by  side  with 
the  dying  and  the  dead  the  living  lay  down.  '  What  think  you,' 
said  Gough  to  Hardinge,  when  they  were  able  to  exchange  in 
private  a  few  words,  '  What  think  you  of  our  prospects  ? ' 
'  Think  ?  '  replied  Hardinge.  '  That  we  must  live  or  die  where 
we  stand.'  '  That  is  exactly  my  opinion,'  returned  Gough  ;  '  so 
we  understand  each  other.'  They  pressed  hands,  and  parted  in 
silence." 


214    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

The  guns  of  the  enemy  were  so  much  heavier  than  those 
of  the  British  that  the  Generals  soon  felt  sure  that  their 
sole  hope  was  in  a  bayonet  charge.  Nearly  the  whole  force 
rushed  at  once,  with  a  cheer,  upon  the  Sikh  fortification. 
Wearied  and  hungry  as  they  were,  they  carried  the  intrenched 
camp,  and  pressed  forward  in  line,  carrying  everything  before 
them,  the  two  Generals  riding  in  front,  with  captured  ban- 
ners borne  at  their  side. 

The  battle  of  Ferozeshah  was  gained ;  the  Sikh  army 
which  had  lost  it  was  in  flight :  but  another  Sikh  army,  as 
large,  and  as  well  provided  with  artillery,  was  within  three 
days'  march.  It  was  because  this  army  was  so  near  that 
Gough  and  Hardinge  had  risked  with  weary  troops  so  des- 
perate a  battle. 

As  the  fresh  army  of  the  enemy  came  up,  for  the  first 
and  only  time  the  brave  heart  of  Lord  Gough  failed  him. 
This  is  what  he  has  recorded  in  a  private  letter  :  — 

"The  only  time  I  felt  a  doubt  was  towards  the  evening  of 
the  22d,  when  the  fresh  enemy  advanced  with  heavy  columns 
of  infantry,  cavalry,  and  guns ;  and  our  cavalry  horses  were  so 
thoroughly  done  up  that  they  could  not  even  command  a  trot. 
For  a  moment  I  felt  regret  (and  I  deeply  deplore  my  want 
of  confidence  in  Him  who  never  failed  me  nor  forsook  me)  as 
each  passing  shot  left  me  on  horseback ;  but  it  was  only  for  a 
moment." 

The  battle  had  begun  —  who  knows  how  it  might  have 
ended? — when  a  staff-officer  blundered,  and  gave  an  order 
for  which  he  had  no  authority.  This  providential  blunder 
saved  the  army.  The  Sikhs,  seeing  the  cavalry  and  horse- 
artillery  of  the  British  beginning  to  move  off  the  field,  took 
it  for  granted  that  they  must  have  some  great  design  in 
such  a  movement,  and,  believing  their  flank  was  to  be 
turned,  wavered,  and  fell  into  disorder.  The  British  infantry 
sprang  forward  with  a  loud  cheer.  A  moment  before,  they 
had  been  indignant  and  disheartened  by  the  apparent 
desertion  of  the  cavalry  ;  now  they  carried  everything  before 
them,  and  the  Sikh  fugitives  never  stopped  till  they  had 
recrossed  the  Sutlej. 


TEN  YEARS,— 18J.1-1851.  21$ 

When  all  was  over,  the  British  troops  were  called  to  as- 
semble before  the  commanders-in-chief,  that  solemn  thanks 
might  be  offered  to  Almighty  God.  One  of  the  persons 
present  in  these  battles  was  Prince  Waldemar,  brother  to 
the  king  of  Prussia,  who  was  then  on  a  tour  in  India,  and 
had  joined  the  English  army. 

After  these  dangers  were  passed,  the  army  had  rest  for 
almost  a  month.  Reinforcements  were  hurried  up  from 
every  part  of  British  India,  and  by  the  end  of  January, 
1846,  the  generals  had  a  much  larger  force  than  they  had 
had  before.  But  the  Sikhs  still  had  command  of  the  Sutlej, 
over  which  they  had  a  bridge  of  boats,  with  what  engineer 
officers  call  a  tete  de  pont,  very  strongly  fortified.  There 
were  also  very  practicable  fords.  The  village  near  this  tete 
de  pont  was  called  Sobraon,  and  the  battle  of  Sobraon  was 
fought  February  10,  1846.  The  head  of  the  bridge  was 
defended  by  thirty  thousand  Sikhs,  with  an  immense  train  of 
artillery.  The  English  army  had  also  received  some  heavy 
guns  from  Delhi.  The  approach  to  the  tete  de  pont  was 
over  a  perfectly  level  plain,  with  no  cover  whatever  for  the 
attacking  party.  The  infantry,  however,  dashed  forward  at 
a  run.  Among  the  bravest  were  the  Ghoorkas,  a  native 
regiment  of  mountaineers,  in  dark-green  uniforms.  They 
penetrated  the  intrenchments,  but  could  make  no  advance. 

Long  and  desperate  was  the  conflict  within  the  works ; 
but  gradually  the  Sikhs  were  forced  back  on  the  bridge  and 
the  fords,  which  had  risen  seven  inches  during  the  fight. 
The  slaughter  of  the  fugitives  as  they  tried  to  recross 
the  river  was  horrible.  Their  loss  on  that  day  was  ten 
thousand  men. 

Four  days  afterwards  the  British  army  crossed  the  Sutlej 
by  a  ford,  and  marched  on  Lahore.  The  Maranee  and  her 
court  did  not  wait  their  coming.  They  hastened  to  make 
submission  to  the  English,  and  the  war  was  over.  Peace 
lasted  but  a  little  while. 

Sir  Henry  Hardinge  returned  to  England,  leaving  his  gov- 
ernment in  apparent  tranquillity.  He  and  Sir  Hugh  Gough 
were  both  raised  to  the  peerage.  Sir  Charles  Napier  also 


2l6    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

returned  home  on  sick  leave.  His  strength  was  being 
slowly  sapped  by  a  mortal  disease. 

But  a  year  had  not  passed  before  it  became  certain  that 
the  Sikh  armed  force  was  going  to  submit  neither  to  native 
rulers,  nor  to  the  English  supremacy.  The  first  Sikh  aggres- 
sion was  the  murder  of  the  British  Resident  at  Mooltan, 
Mr.  Vans  Agnew.  At  once  an  English  force  was  sent  against 
them,  and  soon  another  great  Sikh  war  was  on  the  hands  of 
the  British. 

Lord  Dalhousie  was  then  Governor-General,  and  remained 
so  until  Lord  Canning  replaced  him  in  1856,  the  year 
before  the  Mutiny.  Lord  Gough,  still  commander-in-chief, 
again  took  the  field  against  the  Sikhs.  This  time  he  was 
not  only  across  the  Sutlej,  but  in  the  heart  of  the  Punjaub. 

He  fought  the  Sikhs,  November  22,  1848,  at  a  place 
called  Ramnugger,  and  neither  party  seems  to  have  gained 
a  decisive  victory.  He  fought  them  again,  January  12, 
1849,  at  Chillianwallah,  with  the  same  result. 

When  this  news  reached  England,  the  public  were  greatly 
excited  against  the  brave  Lord  Gough,  and  demanded  that 
he  should  be  superseded.  "  If  you  don't  go,"  said  the 
Duke  of  Wellington,  then  in  his  eightieth  year,  to  Sir 
Charles  Napier,  —  "if  you  don't  go,  I  must"  Sir  Charles, 
though  ill,  went  out  to  supersede  Lord  Gough ;  but  before 
he  arrived,  Lord  Gough  had  redeemed  his  partial  failures. 

A  month  after  the  battle  of  Chillianwallah  was  fought  the 
battle  of  Goojerat. 

This  victory  was  decisive.  A  band  of  Afghan  horsemen, 
who  had  joined  the  Sikhs  fled  to  their  native  hills.  The 
Sikh  army  was  utterly  broken  up.  A  large  part  of  its 
warriors  enlisted  in  a  British  contingent,  and  no  braver 
or  more  faithful  soldiers  serve  the  Queen.  As  irregular 
cavalry,  they  are  beyond  all  price.  The  Maranee  and  her 
son  were  deprived  of  their  power,  but  handsomely  pensioned 
by  the  English  Government.  The  Punjaub  was  annexed  to 
British  India. 

It  is  impossible  in  a  sketch  so  brief  as  this  to  do  more 
than  allude  to  many  subjects  that  attracted  the  interest  and 


TEN  YEARS,— mi-1851.  2 1/ 

engaged  the  attention  of  the  English  public  during  the  ten 
years  that  elapsed  between  the  marriage  of  the  Queen  and 
the  opening  of  the  Great  Exhibition. 

Of  the  visits  exchanged  between  the  royalties  of  England 
and  the  fatherly  King  Louis  Philippe,  I  have  told  at  length 
elsewhere,  and  also  how  the  entente  cordiale  was  broken  by 
the  bourgeois  King's  unfortunate  matrimonial  speculation  for 
his  son  in  the  matter  of  the  Spanish  marriages.  The  -fall  of 
Louis  Philippe  was  the  signal  for  revolutionary  excitement 
all  over  Europe.  England  caught  the  infection,  and  Chart- 
ism (now  forgotten)  was  the  war-cry  of  the  day.  Kossuth 
came  to  England  in  1850,  but  was  not  openly  recognized 
by  the  English  Government,  as  he  had  hoped  and  expected. 
But  a  few  words  may  be  said  of  the  Barclay  and  Perkins 
episode,  when  the  Austrian  general  Haynau  (the  flogger  of 
women)  received  his  deserts,  in  September,  1850,  at  the 
hands  of  London  working-men  :  — 

"  The  appearance  of  General  Haynau  was  remarkable,  and  he 
was  easily  recognized.  He  was  unusually  tall  and  slender,  with 
gray  moustaches  of  extraordinary  length,  fringing  a  sallow, 
meagre  face,  in  which  deep-set  gray  eyes  looked  impassively 
out  from  beneath  bushy  eyebrows.  It  was  said  at  the  time 
that  a  person  employed  in  Barclay  and  Perkins's  brewery  had 
reasons  for  seeking  to  be  avenged  on  him  for  some  outrage  on 
a  kinsman  who  had  fallen  into  his  power.  But  however  this 
might  be,  General  Haynau  had  scarcely  entered  the  precincts 
of  the  brewery  when  his  presence  became  known  to  nearly 
every  person  employed  in  the  establishment.  The  men  instantly 
turned  out,  armed  with  whatever  offensive  weapon  came  most 
readily  to  hand,  and  assaulted  him  with  every  sort  of  abusive 
epithet.  A  truss  of  straw  was  dropped  on  his  head  from  the 
floor  above  him,  and  he  was  pelted  with  missiles.  His  hat  was 
knocked  over  his  eyes,  he  was  hustled  from  side  to  side,  his 
coat  was  torn,  and  one  man,  seizing  his  long  moustache,  tried  to 
cut  it  off.  At  length  the  General  and  his  friends  fought  their 
way  out  of  the  brewery,  but  only  to  fall  into  the  hands  of  the 
populace.  Finally,  he  took  refuge  in  the  upper  room  of  a  public- 
house,  and  was  got  away  by  the  police. 

"  Inquiries  were  immediately  set  on  foot,  at  the  instigation 
of  the  Home  Office,  but  without  success.  General  Haynau 


2l8    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

refused  to  prosecute.  Lord  Palmerston  expressed  to  the  Aus- 
trian Charge"  d'Affaires  in  person  the  regret  of  the  Government 
for  what  had  taken  place;  but  General  Haynau  would  have 
done  better,  he  said,  to  keep  out  of  England." 

The  matter  led  to  one  of  the  sharp  disputes  between  the 
Queen  and  Lord  Palmerston ;  for  when  she  objected  to 
the  way  in  which  he  expressed  himself  in  a  despatch  to  the 
Austrian  Government  on  the  subject,  she  learned  that  the 
letter  had  been  already  sent,  without  waiting  for  her  opinion. 
This  and  Lord  Palmerston's  similar  conduct  in  other  cases 
led  to  his  dismissal  from  the  Foreign  Office,  where  he  had 
presided,  with  brief  intervals  of  retirement,  for  twenty  years. 

These  things,  so  briefly  touched  upon,  relate  to  the  foreign 
policy  of  England  ;  but  it  may  be  better  to  speak  a  little 
more  at  length  on  matters  that  more  nearly  concerned  the 
misfortunes  or  the  well-being  of  the  English  population. 

In  1846,  Sir  Robert  Peel's  ministry  was  defeated  on  an 
Irish  Coercion  Bill,  after  passing  the  bill  for  the  Repeal 
of  the  Corn  Laws.  In  that  year  the  famine  in  Ireland 
became  too  evident  to  be  disregarded.  The  laboring  class 
in  that  island  lived  chiefly  on  that  "cursed  root,"  as 
Cobbett  called  the  potato,1  and  few  received  from  their 
employers  any  money  wages.  They  lived  principally  on 
what  was  called  "  the  cottier  system ;  "  that  is  to  say,  a 
man  worked  for  a  landowner  on  condition  of  getting  a  bit 
of  land  on  which  he  might  grow  potatoes,  the  sole  food  of 
himself  and  his  family.  News  came  to  England  in  the 
autumn  of  1845  that  the  long  continuance  of  sunless  wet 
and  cold  "  had  imperilled,  if  not  wholly  destroyed,  the  food 
of  a  people."  But  public  feeling  was  not  fully  aroused 
until  a  few  months  had  developed  the  horrors  of  the 
famine. 

On  the  fall  of  Sir  Robert  Peel,  the  Whigs,  with  a  ministry 

1  Potatoes  in  France  in  the  eighteenth  century  were  called  "  Hano- 
verian roots,"  and  were  suspected  of  some  taint  of  Protestantism  and 
heresy,  until  it  was  reported  among  the  peasantry  that  King  Louis 
XVI.  had  had  a  dish  of  them  served  at  his  table,  and  had  pronounced 
them  excellent. 


TEN  YEARS,  — 18^.1-1851.  219 

composed  largely  of  weak  men,  came  into  power,  and  the 
Tory  party  split  into  two  divisions,  —  the  Conservatives, 
who  followed  Sir  Robert  Peel,  and  the  landowners,  or  old 
Tory  party,  whose  leaders  were  Lord  George  Bentinck  and 
Mr.  Disraeli. 

At  first  it  was  not  thought  that  the  failure  of  the  potato 
crop  would  be  more  than  partial;  but  soon  it  began  to 
appear  that  for  two  years  at  least  the  food  of  the  poor  in 
Ireland  was  absolutely  gone.  A  peculiar  form  of  fever,  too, 
called  the  famine  fever,  set  in  among  the  sufferers.  In 
some  districts  people  died  by  hundreds  of  fever,  dysentery, 
and  of  sheer  starvation.  In  some  of  the  worst  districts  the 
parish  authorities  could  no  longer  afford  to  pay  for  coffins. 
How  well  I  remember  dreadful  stories  of  famishing  families, 
and  women  dying  by  the  wayside  after  walking  miles  upon 
miles  to  procure  food.  There  was  almost  a  frenzy  of  sym- 
pathy for  the  sufferers  in  England.  Little  children  volun- 
tarily denied  themselves  all  delicacies  that  the  mite  such 
things  would  cost  might  swell  their  elders'  subscription  to 
the  fund  for  sufferers  by  the  Irish  famine.  Justin  McCarthy 
tells  us,  "  Whatever  might  be  said  about  the  dilatoriness  of 
the  Whig  Government  in  passing  measures  for  the  relief  of 
starving  Ireland,  no  one  could  doubt  the  good-will  of  the 
English  people." 

In  London  and  the  country  towns  subscription  lists  were 
opened,  and  the  most  liberal  contributions  poured  in.  In 
Liverpool  many  merchants  each  gave  ^1,000.  The  Qua- 
kers sent  over  a  delegation  to  Ireland  to  distribute  their 
relief.  Other  religious  bodies  did  likewise.  National  asso- 
ciations for  relief  were  formed.  Help,  too,  came  in  from 
other  countries.  The  United  States  loaded  several  vessels 
of  its  navy  with  supplies.  Joy-bells  were  rung  all  day  when 
one  of  these  vessels  entered  a  harbor  in  Galway.  But  some 
of  the  help  they  brought  proved  less  of  a  boon  than  was 
expected.  The  United  States  Government  had  naturally 
sent  large  supplies  of  corn-meal.  When  this  was  distributed 
to  the  ignorant  and  shiftless,  who  had  no  eggs  or  milk  to 
cook  it  with,  and  no  one  to  instruct  them  how  to  make 


220    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  mush,"  or  "johnny-cake,"  or  "scratch-backs,"  or  any  of 
the  other  compositions  of  corn-meal  known  in  a  planter's 
kitchen,  it  was  pronounced  so  unpalatable  that  it  could  only 
be  eaten  as  the  next  best  thing  to  starvation.  In  its  half- 
cooked  state,  it  produced  an  aggravation  of  dysentery  and 
similar  troubles. 

At  the  present  day  quantities  of  corn  and  of  corn-meal 
are  exported  to  Ireland.  Corn  feeds  stock  all  over  Great 
Britain,  and  corn-meal  shares  with  the  potato  the  task  of 
feeding  the  Irish  peasantry. 

Terrible  as  the  famine  was,  it  left  some  good  behind.  It 
roused  the  Irish  peasant  from  his  fatalism.  It  drew  atten- 
tion to  the  defective  land-system  in  Ireland,  it  enlarged  the 
cheap  food  resources  of  the  people,  and  it  sent  us  in  America, 
at  the  very  moment  when  railway  laborers  were  wanted,  a 
supply  of  emigrants  very  different  from  the  puny,  anarchistic, 
half- civilized  Poles,  Hungarians,  and  Italians  whom  we  find 
it  so  hard  either  to  assimilate  or  control.  The  Irish  immi- 
grant had  his  national  faults,  but  his  children,  "country 
born,"  as  the  phrase  is,  are  Americans. 

It  is  computed,  however,  that  by  famine,  fever,  and  emi- 
gration, Ireland,-in  1846,  lost  two  millions  of  her  people. 

The  ten  years  in  "the  forties,"  of  which  this  chapter 
treats,  was  the  period  of  the  great  railroad  craze  in  England. 
Those  were  the  days  of  poor  Hudson,  the  Railway  King,  the 
prototype  of  Jeames  de  la  Pluche,  before  whom  the  rich, 
the  noble,  and  the  beautiful  bowed  down,  in  hopes  that  he 
would  enable  them  to  get  a  share  in  the  good  things  going, 
by  some  happy  investment  of  their  money.  Plans  and  speci- 
fications of  all  projected  railroads  had  to  be  sent  in  to  the 
Parliamentary  Committee  on  Railroad  Affairs,  before  a  cer- 
tain date.  As  that  day  approached,  men  in  the  offices  of 
such  civil  engineers  as  Brunei  and  Stephenson,  worked  night 
after  night,  with  wet  towels  round  their  heads  and  stimu- 
lated by  strong  coffee.  Twenty  guineas  a  day  were  offered 
for  draughtsmen.  The  employees  at  one  office  gained  great 
credit  for  flinging  from  the  top  of  a  cab  at  the  last  moment 
a  bundle  of  papers  at  the  porter,  as  at  midnight  he  was 


TEN  YEARS,  —  1841-1851.  221 

closing  the  committee-room  door.  Half  the  railroads  pro- 
jected were  never  made,  but  England  on  the  map  looked 
like  a  spider's  web. 

Ocean  steamers  began  regular  trips  across  the  Atlantic  in 
this  decade.  "Ah,  my  dear  friend,"  said  Admiral  Sir  Isaac 
Coffin,  in  1839,  to  Vincent  Nolte,  taking  his  hand  kindly, 
"  if  you  esteem  your  life,  give  up  the  thought  of  taking  pas- 
sage in  the  '  Great  Western.'  She  has  had  the  good  fortune 
to  make  one  summer  transatlantic  voyage ;  but  in  autumn 
and  winter  it  is  a  risk  to  human  life  to  sail  in  her.  She 
may  succeed  once  or  twice,  but  in  heavy  winter  storms  no 
steamer  can  scud.  Be  sure  of  that !  "  And  thus  he  talked 
to  other  friends,  including  my  father.  It  was  during  this 
decade  also  that  Mr.  Bayard,  Sr.,  arriving  in  England  with 
plans  for  a  Pacific  Railroad,  requested  my  father  to  show 
them  to  Messrs.  Coutts,  the  great  bankers.  My  father  kept 
the  papers  several  days,  and  then,  yielding  to  the  persusa- 
sions  of  my  mother,  who  assured  him  that  the  partners 
at  Coutts'  would  think  him  crazy  if  he  went  to  them 
with  such  a  wild-cat  scheme,  he  returned  the  papers  to 
Mr.  Bayard. 

In  these  days  Rowland  Hill  achieved  his  great  reform  in 
postage.  He  insisted  that  a  letter  could  be  carried  any- 
where in  the  United  Kingdom  for  a  penny,  and  that  in  a 
few  years  the  increased  multitude  of  letters  would  cover  the 
increased  expenditure. 

When  the  measure  for  the  reduction  of  postage  passed  in 
Parliament,  an  offer  was  made  by  Government  to  all  artists 
and  others  to  come  forward  and  give  plans  for  carrying  it 
into  effect.  The  idea  was  that  each  letter  must  be  put  into 
a  Government  envelope.  Mulready's  envelope  won  the  prize. 
It  may  be  seen  still  in  stamp  albums,  so  covered  with  the 
design  that  there  is  little  room  left  for  an  address.  Britan- 
nia sits  enthroned,  scattering  letters  to  the  four  quarters  of 
the  globe.  There  are  several  pretty  groups,  —  a  girl  read- 
ing her  lover's  letter,  an  old  Scotch  peasant  receiving  one 
from  his  soldier  son,  etc.  I  think  we  used  them  two  or  three 
weeks,  and  then  the  Post-Office  substituted  the  present 


222    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

stamp,  —  "  Queen's  heads,"  we  used  to  call  them,  —  the 
invention  of  which  was  due  to  a  young  employee. 

I  said  that  the  revolutions  of  1848  stirred  up  consid- 
erable revolutionary  feeling  in  Great  Britain.  In  Ireland 
it  took  the  form  of  an  armed  demonstration  by  Young 
Ireland,  led  by  Mr.  Smith  O'Brien,  who  had  failed  to  get 
either  material  aid  or  sympathy  from  Lamartine.  But 
the  Red  Republican  clubs  in  France  were  loud  in  their 
declarations  that  thirty  thousand  Frenchmen  ought  to  assist 
his  cause.  However,  without  French  help,  his  battle,  was 
fought  in  Tipperary  in  Widow  Cormack's  cabbage-garden, 
when,  the  rebel  army  having  been  dispersed  by  a  handful  of 
police,  the  insurrection  was  over. 

The  practical  form  that  revolutionary  fervor  took  in 
England  was  advocacy  of  the  charter. 

As  far  back  as  1835,  Chartism  had  its  beginning  in  Eng- 
land. The  Reform  Bill,  which  was  to  have  given  every- 
thing to  everybody,  —  or,  at  least,  to  have  promoted  that 
happy  result,  —  proved,  as  its  working  became  known,  to  have 
given  little  or  nothing  to  the  laboring  population.  "  The 
only  fruit  of  the  Whig  victory  for  the  lower  class  was  the 
passage  of  the  New  Poor  Law,  and  that  fruit  was  a  bitter 
one."  Before  long,  the  old  plan  of  firing  stackyards  and 
burning  up  machinery  was  resorted  to  ;  and  in  several  places 
the  military  had  to  be  called  out,  until  at  last  the  agitation 
took  shape  in  advocacy  of  what  was  called  the  People's 
Charter.  The  charter  contained  six  clauses.  It  demanded 
universal  suffrage  ;  vote  by  ballot ;  equal  electoral  districts  ; 
annual  parliaments ;  payment  of  members  ;  and  that  every 
man  should  be  eligible  for  a  seat  in  Parliament  without 
any  property  qualification.  To  urge  the  adoption  of 
the  charter,  a  monster  petition  was,  in  1839,  presented  to 
Parliament.  It  purported  to  contain  1,200,000  signatures. 
Mr.  Feargus  O'Connor,  who  agitated  both  for  England  and 
Ireland,  was  the  Chartist  leader.  He  was  anxious  that  the 
petition  should  be  carried  to  the  House  by  a  procession  of 
five  hundred  thousand  men,  each  with  a  musket  on  his 
shoulder;  but  other  counsels  prevailed,  and  on  June  14, 


TEN  YEARS,  — mi-1851.  223 

1839,  the  bulky  document,  attended  by  delegates  from  the 
Trades  Unions,  and  mounted  on  a  car  constructed  for  the 
purpose,  was  carried  to  the  House  of  Commons,  and  laid, 
literally  on  the  floor,  but,  in  parliamentary  language,  "on 
the  table ;  "  that  is,  no  notice  whatever  was  taken  of  it. 
It  made  not  the  slightest  impression. 

Chartism  continued  to  be  agitated  for  nearly  nine  more 
years,  until,  in  the  spring  of  1848,  when  all  Europe  was 
feeling  the  effects  of  the  late  improvised  French  Revolu- 
tion, Feargus  O'Connor,  unconscious  that  events  in  other 
countries  had  put  the  nobility,  gentry,  and  bourgeoisie  of 
England  on  their  guard,1  and  also  that  London  does  not 
make  revolutions  and  send  laws  into  the  Provinces  as 
Paris  does  in  France,  thought  the  moment  had  arrived  to 
resuscitate  the  Monster  Petition,  and  possibly  to  overthrow 
the  British  Government.  During  the  month  of  March  there 
had  been  local  riots  throughout  England  and  Scotland, 
suppressed  everywhere,  of  course,  but  serving  to  put  the 
enemies  of  Chartism  on  the  qui  vive.  Ireland  took  no  inter- 
est in  the  Charter;  what  she  was  preparing  to  agitate  for 
was  not  a  Reformed  British  Parliament,  but  a  Parliament  for 
herself. 

1  The  catechism  learned  by  all  members  of  the  most  popular 
Revolutionary  Society  in  Paris  at  that  period  may  be  supposed  to 
contain  the  views  and  principles  of  others :  — 

"  What  is  the  present  government  ?  —  A  traitor  to  the  French  people. 

"In  whose  interest  does  it  govern?  —  In  that  of  a  small  number  of 
privileged  persons. 

"  Who  are  the  aristocrats  of  the  present  day  ?  —  All  moneyed  men, 

—  bankers,  contractors,  monopolists,  great  proprietors,  stock  operators, 
in  one  word,  all  who  grow  rich  at  the  expense  of  the  people. 

"  In  right  of  what  do  they  govern? —  Force. 
"  What  is  the  chief  vice  of  society  ? —  Selfishness. 
"What  takes  the  place  of  honor,  honesty,  and  virtue?  —  Money. 
"  Who  is  the  man  most  esteemed  in  the  world? —  He  who  is  rich  and 
powerful. 
"  Who  is  the  man  persecuted,  despised,  downtrodden  by  the  law  ? 

—  The  poor  man  and  the  weak. 

"  Who  do  you  mean  by  the  people  ?  —  All  laboring  men  who  are 
citizens. 
"  How  does  the  law  treat  the  people  ?  —  Like  slaves." 


224    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY, 

Mr.  Feargus  O'Connor,  now  a  Member  of  Parliament, 
undertook  to  present  the  Monster  Petition  to  the  House  of 
Commons.  The  presentation,  it  was  announced,  would 
take  place  on  April  10,  1848. 

My  father,  with  his  family,  was  then  in  London,  on  our 
way  to  the  United  States.  We  had  left  Paris  a  month  after 
Louis  Philippe,  —  as  soon,  indeed,  as  we  could  get  away ; 
for  it  was  almost  impossible  for  several  weeks  to  procure 
any  small  change. 

In  view  of  probable  disturbances,  all  the  police  in  Lon- 
don were  ordered  to  be  on  duty  on  the  line  of  the  proces- 
sion; and,  to  keep  peace  and  awe  thieves  in  other  parts 
of  London,  all  the  householders  and  young  men  enrolled 
themselves  for  the  day  as  special  constables.  Prince  Louis 
Napoleon  patrolled  a  street  near  a  house  where  we  were 
staying.  A  deathlike  stillness  prevailed  that  day  over  the 
greater  part  of  London.  Chevalier  Bunsen  tells  us  that  a 
night  or  two  before,  at  a  party  at  Lord  Palmerston's,  he  had 
said  to  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  "  Your  Grace  will  take  us 
all  in  charge,  and  London,  too,  on  the  tenth?"  "Yes," 
replied  the  Duke,  "  we  have  taken  our  measures ;  but  not  a 
soldier  will  you  see." 

The  Queen,  with  her  three-weeks-old  baby  (Princess 
Louise),  went  down  to  Osborne.  The  Bank  of  England 
closed  its  doors  and  looked  deserted ;  but  it  had  a  strong 
armed  force  within. 

The  day,  if  I  remember,  was  somewhat  lowering.  My 
father  went  off  early  towards  Kennington  Common,  where 
the  Chartists  were  to  assemble.  He  had  just  seen  a  Pa- 
risian mob  in  all  the  excitement  of  a  revolution,  and  he 
wanted  to  compare  them.  The  greater  part  of  the  men  he 
saw  collecting  upon  Kennington  Common  he  reported  to 
be  a  dejected,  hungry-looking  rabble.  Instead  of  the  one 
hundred  and  fifty  thousand  men  whom  Feargus  O'Connor 
expected  to  march  in  his  procession,  there  were  not  twenty- 
five  thousand  at  the  place  of  rendezvous,  and  the  larger 
part  of  these  were  mere  spectators. 

The   procession  was  never   formed.      The  police  gave 


TEN  YEARS,  — 184-1-1851.  22$ 

notice  to  Mr.  O'Connor  that  none  would  be  allowed  to  fol- 
low the  petition.  The  Chartist  leader  mounted  on  a  cab 
and  announced  this  to  the  assemblage.  Much  confusion 
arose.  Some  of  those  in  charge  of  the  proceedings  were 
for  braving  the  police,  but  wiser  counsels  prevailed.  The 
petition  was  packed  into  three  street  cabs,  and  sent  off  by 
itself  to  the  House  of  Commons,  whither  Mr.  O'Connor 
hurried  to  receive  it. 

A  procession  was  then  formed  of  about  eight  thousand 
persons  ;  but  a  manoeuvre,  prepared  beforehand  by  the  Duke 
of  Wellington,  cut  it  in  two.  Only  a  few  hundreds  crossed 
the  bridges,  the  rest  dispersed,  and  by  nightfall  London 
had  recovered  from  its  fears,  and  was  rejoicing  in  its  powers 
of  self-protection. 

Mr.  McCarthy  is  quite  right  in  saying  that  nothing  could 
have  exceeded  the  alarm  of  London  on  the  morning  of  the 
loth  of  April.  We  had  just  come  scathless  out  of  a  Revo- 
lution, so  that  it  rather  amused  us ;  but  Mr.  McCarthy 
says :  — 

"The  Chartists  in  their  most  sanguine  moments  never  as- 
cribed to  themselves  half  the  strength  that  honest  alarmists  of 
the  bourgeois  class  were  ready  that  morning  to  ascribe  to  them. 
The  wildest  rumors  were  spread  abroad  in  many  parts  of  the 
metropolis,  and  citizens  were  left  during  the  greater  part  of  the 
day  to  all  the  agonies  of  uncertainty  and  doubt." 

Mr.  O'Connor  presented  the  petition.  He  told  the 
House  that  it  contained  five  million  seven  hundred  thou- 
sand signatures.  The  Committee  on  Public  Petitions  was 
directed  to  ascertain  this,  and  report  to  the  House  accord- 
ingly. The  Committee  called  in  a  small  army  of  law  sta- 
tioner's clerks,  and  went  to  work  to  analyze  the  signatures. 
Instead  of  five  million  seven  hundred  thousand,  they  fell 
short  of  two  million. 

"  But  that  was  not  all.  The  Committee  found  in  many  cases 
that  whole  sheets  of  the  petition  were  signed  by  the  one  hand,  and 
that  eight  per  cent  of  the  signatures  were  those  of  women.  The 
names  of  the  Queen,  Prince  Albert,  the  Duke  of  Wellington, 

'5 


226    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Sir  Robert  Peel,  Lord  John  Russell,  etc.,  appeared  again  and 
again  on  the  Chartist  roll.  '  Cheeks  the  Marine '  and  '  Davy 
Jones'  were  likewise  repeated  with  bewildering  iteration." 

A  few  nights  after  the  loth  of  April  I  was  present  at 
Exeter  Hall  to  hear  the  oratorio  of  the  "Creation."  But 
before  the  oratorio  began,  "God  save  the  Queen  "  was  called 
for.  The  audience  rose  to  its  feet,  as  in  England  it  is 
proper  to  do  when  the  national  air  is  sung ;  but  such  wild 
enthusiasm  I  had  never  witnessed  as  the  great  organ  and 
the  great  chorus  led  the  anthem,  and  every  voice  in  the 
vast  crowd  joined,  with  waving  of  hats  and  handkerchiefs, 
while  very  many  eyes  were  filled  with  tears.  A  week  or 
two  before  I  had  heard  the  "  Marseillaise  "  sung  on  the 
Boulevards  by  three  hundred  thousand  voices  at  the  funeral 
of  the  "  victims ;  "  but  this  burst  of  loyalty  on-  the  per- 
formance of  "God  save  the  Queen"  was  even  more  spirit- 
stirring. 

The  Chartist  movement  died  out ;  it  was  smothered  by 
ridicule.  Its  leader,  Feargus  O'Connor,  became  insane. 
Some  of  the  reforms  petitioned  for  have  been  since  adopted 
by  Parliament,  but  not  in  deference  to  Chartist  agitation. 
The  secret  ballot  is  now  employed  at  elections ;  but  its 
working  by  no  means  fulfils  the  expectations  formed  by 
those  who  clamored  for  it  in  1848. 


CHAPTER   IX. 

THE    GREAT    EXHIBITION. SIR    ROBERT    PEEL. THE    DUKE 

OF   WELLINGTON.  BARON    STOCKMAR. 

'T^HE  last  chapter  has  told  some  of  the  events  of  Queen 
•*•  Victoria's  early  reign.  Those  years  found  her,  in  the 
words  of  the  national  anthem,  "  victorious,  happy,  and  glori- 
ous," loving  and  beloved,  with  her  young  children  growing  up 
around  her,  and  with  the  husband  who  was  so  dear  to  her 
becoming  more  and  more  appreicated  by  the  best  men  of 
England,  as  his  high  qualities  ripened  and  developed  day 
by  day. 

The  little  rift,  however,  in  those  days  in  the  Queen's  happi- 
ness (it  can  hardly  take  the  name  of  sorrow)  was  that  she  knew 
that  Prince  Albert  amongst  her  "  people  "  was  not  popular. 
German  alliances  are  never  liked  in  England.  The  multi- 
plicity of  petty  princedoms  in  Germany  has  made  German 
brides  and  bridegrooms  almost  always  poor,  and  the  British 
public  despises  poverty  in  high  places.  When  Prince  Albert 
married,  Parliament  had  refused  to  give  him  the  allowance 
that,  in  1816,  had  been  given  to  Prince  Leopold,  and 
it  refused  him  the  title  of  Prince  Consort,  which  would 
have  given  him  precedence  next  after  his  wife  on  state 
occasions. 

One  of  the  Prince's  especial  duties  was  to  preside  at  pub- 
lic meetings  and  at  public  dinners.  His  speeches  were  not 
elegant,  but  they  were  always  full  of  good  sense,  and  were 
delivered  in  excellent  English,  though  he  retained  a  slight 
German  accent.  He  took  an  especial  interest  in  the  work- 
ing-classes, saying  in  public  that  it  gratified  him  to  take  any 
opportunity  of  proving  to  those  who  attacked  the  royal 
family  that  that  family  was  not  merely  living  on  the  earn- 


228    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

ings  of  the  people,  as  some  books  and  newspapers  would 
represent,  without  caring  for  the  poor  laborers,  but  were 
anxious  for  their  welfare  above  everything,  and  ready  to 
co-operate  in  any  scheme  for  the  amelioration  of  their  con- 
dition. "We  may  possess  these  feelings,"  he  adds,  "and 
yet  the  mass  of  the  people  may  be  ignorant  we  feel  them, 
because  they  have  never  heard  it  expressed,  or  seen  any 
tangible  proof  of  it." 

This  interest  in  the  welfare  of  the  laboring-classes  (a 
prominent  subject  now)  was  a  very  novel  one  then,  and  it 
stimulated  the  Prince  to  make  his  plan  of  the  Great  Exhi- 
bition. The  idea  and  the  plan  were  discussed  between  the 
Prince  and  Sir  Robert  Peel  for  several  years  before  it  was 
propounded  to  other  influential  men  in  England.  To  Prince 
Albert  belong  all  the  glory  and  credit  of  the  First  Great 
Exhibition,  and  of  the  other  exhibitions  that  have  succeeded 
it,  including  the  one  pre-eminent  in  beauty  and  extent,  our 
own  World's  Fair  in  the  White  City.  He  showed  others 
how  to  break  the  egg  and  set  it  on  its  end. 

The  germ  idea  of  exhibitions  of  manufactured  articles 
and  machinery  the  Prince  got  from  the  history  of  his  own 
country ;  it  is  found  in  the  Frankfort  fairs  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  "  where,"  as  a  scholar  and  an  eye-witness  has  told 
us,  "books,  pictures,  tapestry,  the  masterpieces  of  the 
armorer's  art,  the  goldsmith's,  and  the  jeweller's,"  were 
drawn  to  Frankfort,  as  a  convenient  centre,  from  all  parts 
of  the  Continent,  besides  every  invention  of  machinery  that 
could  make  one  pair  of  hands  do  the  work  of  several. 
"Machines  of  exceeding  ingenuity  are  there,"  says  the 
scholar  (contemporary,  probably,  with  Columbus) ,  —  "  ma- 
chines worthy  of  Archimedes  himself,  —  and  numberless 
instruments  adapted  for  use  in  different  arts." 

In  France  there  had  been  exhibitions  of  French  manu- 
factures from  1798,  during  the  Directory,  to  1849  ;  but  the 
Prince's  idea  was  to  have  an  exhibition  of  the  products  of 
all  nations.  Up  to  that  time,  "all  nations"  had  preferred 
to  keep  workmen  of  other  countries  from  seeing  or  knowing 
too  much  about  their  own  especial  industries ;  so  that  this 


THE   GREAT  EXHIBITION.  22Q 

Exhibition  was  "  a  new  departure,"  and  a  great  advance  in 
international  good  feeling  and  liberal  thought. 

The  idea  of  such  an  enterprise  was  first  propounded  by 
the  Prince  in  the  summer  of  1849  to  f°ur  leading  members 
of  the  Society  of  Arts,  and  it  was  at  once  decided  that  the 
building  must  be  in  Hyde  Park,  as  the  Paris  Exhibition  of 
French  Manufactures  had  been  held  in  the  Champs  Elys£es. 
From  that  day  till  May  i,  1851,  when  the  Exhibition  was 
opened,  the  opposition  to  it  of  all  kinds  was  inconceivable. 
The  "Times"  attacked  the  idea  of  its  being  in  Hyde 
Park.  "  They  would  like  to  banish  us  and  our  nuisance 
to  the  Isle  of  Dogs,"  wrote  the  Prince  to  Baron  Stockmar, 
—  the  Isle  of  Dogs  being  an  island  in  the  river  Thames. 

The  Prince's  idea  was  that  the  Exhibition  should  be 
divided  into  four  great  sections,  —  the  first  an  exhibition  of 
raw  materials  and  produce ;  the  second,  machinery  and 
ingenious  inventions ;  the  third,  manufactured  articles ;  the 
fourth,  sculpture  and  art. 

The  bankers  and  merchants  of  London  and  the  City 
Government  responded  eagerly.  A  commissioner  was  ap- 
pointed to  superintend  and  to  promote  the  Exhibition, 
and  money  was  subscribed  freely. 

So  far,  all  seemed  to  prosper.  At  the  Lord  Mayor's  din- 
ner, in  1849,  Prince  Albert  spoke  warmly  of  his  project. 
He  fancied  it  was  to  be  the  inauguration  of  peace.  On  the 
contrary,  it  was  succeeded  immediately  by  the  Crimean 
war;  and  since  then  the  civilized  world,  burdened  with 
military  preparations,  has  been  "  tossed  like  the  troubled 
sea,  that  cannot  rest." 

"The  Exhibition,"  said  the  Prince,  "will  give  the  world 
a  true  test,  a  living  picture,  of  the  point  of  industrial 
development  that  the  world  has  reached,  and  will  be  a  new 
starting-point  for  men."  And,  in  truth,  it  became  to  the 
industrial  world  an  education. 

Nevertheless,  in  1849,  1850,  and  1851,  the  opposition 
to  the  scheme  was  vehement  and  excessive.  "  Many 
persons,"  says  Mr.  Justin  McCarthy,  "were  disposed  to 
sneer  at  it ;  many  were  sceptical  about  its  doing  any 


230    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

good ;  not  a  few  still  regarded  Prince  Albert  as  a  for- 
eigner and  a  pedant,  and  were  slow  to  believe  that  any- 
thing really  practical  could  be  developed  under  his  influence 
and  protection." 

One  of  the  funniest  movements  got  up  in  opposition  to 
it  was  that  of  Colonel  Sibthorp,  —  a  Member  of  the 
House  of  Commons  who  seemed  to  have  been  sent  up  to 
Parliament  for  its  especial  diversion.  Tall,  lank,  cadaver- 
ous, with  loose  coat,  loose  trousers,  a  white  hat,  and  an 
enormous  moustache,  we  may  see  him  in  every  one  of  the 
early  numbers  of  "  Punch  "  for  many  years.  He  was  the 
incarnation  of  fanatic  Toryism.  Probably  no  other  edu- 
cated man  in  England  went  the  length  he  did  in  opposition 
to  all  progress  and  any  change.  "  Foreigners  he  lumped 
together,"  says  Justin  McCarthy,  "  as  a  race  of  beings  whose 
chief  characteristics  were  Popery  and  immorality ;  "  and  to 
invite  over  to  England  hordes  of  these  wretches  was  the 
greatest  curse  that  could  befall  the  country.  What  influ- 
ence might  not  this  influx  have  on  English  morals?  "Take 
care,"  he  cried  in  the  House  of  Commons,  "  of  your  wives 
and  daughters !  Take  care  of  your  property  and  your 
lives  !  "  It  was  Colonel  Sibthorp  who  declared  that  he 
prayed  for  a  great  storm  of  hail  and  lightning  to  shatter  the 
building  destined  to  bring  such  calamities  on  his  country ; 
and  "the  enemy  of  mankind,"  he  declared,  "had  inspired 
Englishmen  with  this  scheme,  by  which  foreigners,  who  by 
free-trade  had  robbed  the  English  of  their  riches,  might  now 
be  enabled  to  rob  them  of  their  honor." 

The  ruin  of  Hyde  Park  was  prophesied  if  it  should  be 
selected  as  the  site  for  the  building  of  the  Exhibition. 
Lord  Campbell,  the  ex-Chancellor,  presented  a  petition  to 
Parliament,  praying  that  no  part  of  Hyde  Park  might  be 
used  for  that  purpose,  and  Lord  Brougham  upbraided 
the  House  of  Commons  for  its  servility  in  deferring  to 
royalty,  and  giving  its  countenance  to  a  rash  idea,  because 
it  was  Prince  Albert's.  "Such  facts,"  he  shouted,  "only 
show  more  painfully  that  absolute  prostration  of  the 
understanding  which  takes  place  even  in  the  minds  of 


THE   GREAT  EXHIBITION.  231 

the  bravest,  when  the  word  Prince  is  mentioned  in  this 
country." 

The  worry  of  this  opposition,  and  the  work  the  enter- 
prise entailed,  tried  the  Prince's  strength  to  the  uttermost. 
His  health  was  good,  but  from  his  boyhood  Stockmar  had 
observed  that  he  had  not  strength  to  bear  a  strain,  and  the 
worry  and  work  necessitated  by  his  great  project  seriously 
told  upon  him.  But  his  sweetness  of  temper  in  this,  as  in 
all  other  trials,  never  forsook  him.  He  was  one  who  had 
learned  "  to  labor  and  to  wait ;  "  or,  in  the  words  of  another 
poet,  could  say, 

"  My  faith  is  large  in  Time 
And  that  which  shapes  it  to  some  perfect  end." 

To  Stockmar  he  wrote  :  — 

"The  opponents  of  the  Exhibition  work  with  might  and  main 
to  throw  all  the  old  women  here  into  a  panic,  and  to  drive 
myself  crazy.  The  strangers,  they  give  out,  are  certain  to 
commence  a  thorough  revolution  here,  to  murder  Victoria 
and  myself,  and  to  proclaim  a  Red  Republic  in  England.  The 
plague,  too,  is  to  be  the  consequence  of  such  vast  multitudes, 
and  it  will  swallow  up  all  those  whom  the  increased  price  of 
everything  has  not  already  swept  away.  For  all  this  I  am 
responsible,  and  against  all  this  I  have  to  make  efficient 
provision." 

The  King  of  Prussia,  a  timid  man  and  an  idealist,  whose 
mind  a  few  years  later  weakened  to  imbecility,  for  a  long 
time  refused  to  let  his  brother  and  heir-presumptive  (the 
future  Kaiser  Wilhelm)  go  to  London  for  the  opening, 
being  afraid  of  Red  Republicans.  The  Duke  of  Cam- 
bridge expressed  himself  in  the  same  way.  "Punch" 
never  ceased  poking  fun  at  the  project ;  diplomatists  dis- 
couraged it :  in  short,  it  was  very  far  from  finding  public 
sympathy.  At  one  time  it  seemed  certain  that  the  Exhibi- 
tion building  would  not  be  suffered  in  Hyde  Park ;  and,  as 
the  Prince  said,  "If  we  are  driven  out  of  the  Park,  the 
work  is  done  for." 

Then,  too,  there  was  the  difficulty  of  choosing  a  design 
for  the  building.  Competitors  were  to  submit  their  draw- 


232    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

ings  to  a  committee  on  a  certain  day.  All  were  huge 
structures  of  brickwork,  costly  and  ugly ;  but  one  must  of 
necessity  have  been  chosen,  had  not,  the  day  before,  a 
certain  thing  taken  place. 

The  Duke  of  Devonshire,  whose  greenhouses  at  Chis- 
wick  are  one  of  the  wonders  in  England,  had  a  landscape- 
gardener  in  his  employ  named  Joseph  Paxton.  He  was 
the  son  of  a  common  gardener,  but  had  had  a  superior 
education,  and  the  position  he  held  gave  him  standing 
as  a  gentleman,  so  that  he  was  a  magistrate  and  a  member 
of  the  Quarter  Sessions  at  Derby.  He  was  listening  to  the 
trial  of  some  culprit,  long  drawn  out,  and  drawing  on  some 
paper  before  him.  When  the  trial  and  the  drawing  were 
finished  he  was  so  well  satisfied  with  the  latter  that  he 
resolved  rapidly  to  complete  it,  and  to  take  it  instantly 
up  to  London  and  submit  it  to  the  Exhibition  Building 
Committee,  if  there  was  still  time  for  competition.  By 
another  happy  chance  (if  chance  there  be),  there  was  in 
the  same  railway  carriage  a  member  of  the  Building  Com- 
mittee going  up  to  the  meeting  the  next  day.  Mr.  Paxton 
showed  him  his  plan.  He  saw  at  once  its  novelty  and  its 
advantages,  but  feared  it  was  too  late.  However,  it  proved 
to  be  in  time  to  be  considered,  and  was  so  manifestly  the 
best  of  the  designs  that  it  was  at  once  accepted.  The 
building  was  as  much  an  object  of  curiosity  as  were  the 
collections  under  its  roof.  It  was  at  once  fairy-like  and 
gigantic.  The  celerity  with  which  it  rose,  as  it  were,  out 
of  the  earth,  and  the  effect  produced  on  all  minds  by  its 
novelty  and  beauty,  are  best  described  by  Thackeray :  — 

"  But  yesterday  "&  naked  sod  ' ! 

The  dandies  sneered  from  Rotten  Row, 
And  cantered  o'er  it,  to  and  fro ; 

And  see  —  't  is  done  ! 
As  though  't  were  by  a  wizard's  rod, 
A  blazing  arch  of  lucid  glass 
Leaps  like  a  fountain  from  the  grass 
To  meet  the  sun  1 " 

Lord  Palmerston  wrote  to  Lord  Normanby  in  Paris  :  — • 


THE   GREAT  EXHIBITION.  233 

"  The  building  itself  is  far  more  worth  seeing  than  anything 
in  it,  though  many  of  its  contents  are  worthy  of  admiration." 

We  can  hardly  have  a  better  account  of  the  opening  of 
the  Exhibition  than  that  given  us  by  the  Queen  herself :  — 

"  The  Queen  and  Prince  came  back  to  London  a  month 
before  the  opening  of  the  Exhibition.  They  found  the  beauti- 
ful building  finished,  it  having  been  raised  almost  like  Alad- 
din's palace,  and  goods  were  pouring  in  from  all  directions. 
...  A  few  days  before  the  opening,  the  Queen  made  a  private 
visit  to  the  new  Industrial  Palace  to  examine  the  exhibits  more 
closely  than  she  would  have  been  able  to  do  after  they  were 
thrown  open  to  the  public." 

She  says  in  her  own  Journal,  of  this  visit :  — 

"We  remained  there  two  hours  and  a  half,  and  I  came  back 
quite  beaten,  and  my  head  bewildered  from  the  myriads  of 
beautiful  and  wonderful  things  which  would  quite  dazzle  one's 
eyes.  Such  efforts  have  been  made,  and  our  people  have 
shown  such  taste  in  their  manufactures  !  All  owing  to  the 
Great  Exhibition  and  to  Albert,  —  all  to  him  !  We  went  up 
into  the  gallery,  and  the  sight  from  there,  with  the  numerous 
courts  full  of  all  sorts  of  objects  of  art,  manufactures,  etc.,  is 
quite  marvellous.  The  noise  was  overpowering,  for  so  much 
is  going  on  everywhere,  and  from  twelve  to  twenty  thousand 
people  engaged  in  arranging  all  sorts  of  things." 

But  poor  Prince  Albert,  who  was  nearly  worn  out  with 
work  and  worry,  writes  the  same  night  in  his  Journal :  — 

"Terrible  trouble  with  the  arrangements  for  the  opening." 

And  he  was  so  "  beaten,"  to  use  the  Queen's  somewhat 
strange  word,  that  next  day  she  records,  — 

"  My  poor  Albert  is  terribly  fagged.  All  day  long  some 
question  or  other,  some  little  difficulty  or  hitch,  —  all  which 
Albert  takes  with  the  greatest  quiet  and  good  temper." 

The  next  day,  the  Queen  paid  a  second  private  visit  to 
the  Crystal  Palace,  to  show  it  to  the  Prince  and  Princess  of 
Prussia  (the  Emperor  William  and  Empress  Augusta). 

"They  were  thunderstruck,"  she  says.  "The  noise  and 
bustle  were  even  greater  than  yesterday,  as  so  many  prepara- 


234    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH   CENTURY. 

tions  for  the  seats  of  the  spectators  were  going  on.  Certainly 
much  is  still  to  be  done.  We  walked  entirely  round  the  gal- 
leries. The  fountains  were  playing  below,  some  beautiful  ones, 
—  and  many  flowers  and  palms  have  been  placed,  which  have  a 
most  charming  effect." 

She  goes  on  to  remark  that  her  cousin,  Prince  George 
of  Cambridge,  had  showed  great  apprehensions,  which 
she  could  not  understand,  concerning  dangers  attending 
the  assemblage  of  such  a  crowd  as  might  be  expected  in 
the  Parks  on  the  next  day.  But  the  Queen  was  not  to 
be  made  nervous.  She  had  a  well-founded  belief  in  the 
good  temper  and  loyalty  of  her  people,  and  the  event 
proved  that  she  was  right.  "  I  never,"  wrote  a  distin- 
guished General,  "  saw  on  any  occasion,  except  the  corona- 
tion, such  a  universal  disposition  to  be  pleased,  as  was 
shown  on  that  day." 

Of  the  Crystal  Palace  itself,  Sir  Theodore  Martin  says  : 

"  The  shock  of  delighted  surprise  which  every  one  felt  on 
first  entering  the  great  Transept  of  Sir  Joseph  Paxton's  build- 
ing was  as  novel  as  it  was  deep.  Its  vastness  was  measured 
by  the  two  great  elms,  two  of  the  giants  of  the  Park,  which 
rose  far  into  the  air,  with  all  their  wealth  of  foliage,  as  free  and 
unconfined  as  if  there  were  nothing  between  them  and  the  open 
sky.  The  plash  of  fountains,  the  luxuriance  of  the  tropical 
foliage,  the  play  of  colors,  from  the  choicest  flowers,  carried  on 
into  the  vistas  of  the  nave  by  the  rich  dyes  of  carpets  and  stuffs 
from  the  costliest  looms,  were  enough  to  fill  eye  and  mind  with 
a  pleasure  never  to  be  forgotten,  even  without  a  vague  sense  of 
what  lay  far  beyond  in  the  accumulated  results  of  human  inge- 
nuity and  cultivated  art.  One  general  effect  of  beauty  had  been 
produced  by  the  infinitely  varied  work  of  the  thousands  who 
had  separately  co-operated  towards  this  wonderful  display  ;  and 
the  structure  in  which  it  was  set,  by  its  graceful  lines,  and  the 
free  play  of  light  which  it  admitted,  seemed  to  fulfil  every  con- 
dition that  could  be  desired  for  setting  off  the  treasures  thus 
brought  together.  .  .  .  Beautiful  at  all  times,  the  sight  which 
the  Transept  presented  on  the  opening  day,  with  its  eager 
crowds  raised  row  upon  row,  with  the  toilets  of  the  women, 
and  the  sprinkling  of  court  costumes  and  uniforms,  was  one 
which  men  grew  eloquent  in  describing.  As  the  eye  rested  on 


THE    GREAT  EXHIBITION.  235 

the  rich  and  varied  picture,  the  first  thought  that  rose  was  one 
of  gratitude  to  the  Prince  who  had  carried  on  the  work  in  spite 
of  opposition  and  so  many  obstacles,  and  who  stood  there  with 
his  accustomed  air  of  modest  calm,  looking  upon  the  splen- 
did fulfilment  of  what  two  years  before  he  had  conceived  in 
thought." 

The  Queen's  Diary  says,  May  i,  1851  :  — 

"  The  great  event  has  taken  place,  —  a  complete  and  beauti- 
ful triumph,  a  glorious  and  touching  sight,  —  one  which  1  shall 
ever  be  proud  of  for  my  beloved  Albert  and  for  my  country. 
Yes  !  it  is  a  day  which  makes  my  heart  swell  with  pride  and 
glory  and  thankfulness  !  We  began  it  with  tenderest  greetings 
for  the  birthday  of  our  dear  little  Arthur.  Our  humble  gifts  of 
toys  were  added  to  by  far  more  splendid  and  artistic  gifts  from 
the  Prince  and  Princess  of  Prussia,  and  a  nice  little  clock  from 
Mamma.  The  Park  presented  a  wonderful  spectacle,  crowds 
streaming  through  it,  carriages  and  troops  passing,  quite  like 
the  Coronation  Day,  and  for  me  the  same  anxiety,  —  no  !  greater 
anxiety,  —  on  account  of  my  beloved  Albert.  The  day  was 
bright,  and  all  bustle  and  excitement.  At  half-past  eleven  all  the 
procession  of  state  carriages  was  in  motion.  The  Green  Park  and 
Hyde  Park  were  all  one  densely  crowded  mass  of  human  beings, 
in  the  highest  good  humor  and  utmost  enthusiasm.  I  never 
saw  Hyde  Park  look  as  it  did,  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach.  A 
little  rain  fell  just  as  we  started  ;  but  before  we  came  near  the 
Crystal  Palace  the  sun  shone  and  gleamed  upon  the  gigantic 
edifice,  upon  which  the  flags  of  all  nations  were  floating.  We 
drove  up  Rotten  Row,  and  got  out  at  the  entrance  on  that  side. 
The  glimpse  of  the  Transept  through  the  iron  gates,  the  waving 
palms,  flowers,  statues,  myriads  of  people  filling  the  galleries 
and  seats  around,  with  the  flourish  of  trumpets  as  we  entered, 
gave  us  a  sensation  which  I  can  never  forget,  and  I  felt  much 
moved.  We  went  for  a  moment  to  a  little  side-room  where 
we  left  our  shawls,  and  where  we  found  Mamma  and  Mary,1 
and  outside  were  standing  the  other  Princes.  In  a  few  seconds 
we  proceeded,  Albert  leading  me,  having  Vicky  at  his  hand,  and 
Bertie  ho'lding  mine.  The  sight  when  we  came  to  the  middle, 
where  the  steps  and  chair  (which  I  did  not  sit  on)  were  placed, 
with  the  beautiful  crystal  fountain  just  in  front  of  it,  was  mag- 
nificent, —  so  vast,  so  glorious,  so  touching.  One  felt,  as  so 
many  did  whom  I  have  since  spoken  to,  filled  with  devotion,  — 

1  Princess  Mary  of  Cambridge,  now  Princess  Teck. 


236    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

more  so  than  by  any  service  I  had  ever  heard.  The  tremendous 
cheers,  the  joy  expressed  in  every  face,  the  immensity  of  the 
building,  the  mixture  of  palms,  flowers,  trees,  statues,  fountains ; 
the  organ  (with  two  hundred  instruments  and  six  hundred 
voices,  which  sounded  like  nothing) ;  and  my  beloved  husband, 
the  author  of  this  Peace  Festival  which  united  the  industries 
of  all  nations  upon  earth,  —  all  this  was  moving  indeed,  and 
it  was,  and  is,  a  day  to  live  forever.  God  bless  my  dearest 
Albert  !  God  bless  my  dearest  country,  which  has  shown  itself 
so  great  to-day  !  One  felt  so  grateful  to  the  great  God,  who 
seemed  to  pervade  all  and  to  bless  all.  The  only  event  it  at  all 
reminds  me  of  was  the  Coronation  ;  but  this  day's  festival  was  a 
thousand  times  superior,  in  fact,  it  is  unique,  and  can  bear  no 
comparison  from  its  peculiarity,  beauty,  and  combination  of  such 
striking  objects.  I  mean  it  bore  a  slight  resemblance  to  the 
Coronation  only  as  to  its  solemnity.  The  enthusiasm  and  cheer- 
ing, too,  were  much  more  touching;  for  in  a  church  naturally  all 
is  silent. 

"  Albert  left  my  side  after  '  God  Save  the  Queen  '  had  been 
sung,  and,  at  the  head  of  the  Commissioners,  — a  curious  assem- 
blage of  politicians  and  distinguished  men,  —  read  me  the  Report, 
which  is  a  long  one,  and  to  which  I  made  a  short  answer ;  after 
which  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  offered  up  a  short  and 
appropriate  prayer,  followed  by  the  Hallelujah  Chorus,  during 
which  the  Chinese  Mandarin  came  forward  and  made  me  his 
obeisance.  This  concluded,  the  procession  began.  It  was 
beautifully  arranged  and  of  great  length,  the  prescribed  order 
being  exactly  adhered  to.  The  Nave  was  full,  which  had  not 
been  intended  ;  but  still  there  was  no  difficulty,  and  the  whole 
long  walk  from  one  end  to  the  other  was  made  in  the  midst  of 
continued  and  deafening  cheers  and  waving  of  handkerchiefs. 
Every  one's  face  was  bright  and  smiling,  though  many  had  tears 
in  their  eyes.  Many  Frenchmen  cried  out,  'Vive  la  Reine!' 
One  could,  of  course,  see  nothing  but  what  was  near  in  the  Nave, 
and  nothing  in  the  Courts.  The  organs  were  but  little  heard, 
but  the  military  band,  at  one  end,  had  a  very  fine  effect.  As  we 
passed  along,  they  played  the  march  from  '  Athalie.'  The  beau- 
tiful Amazon  in  bronze,  by  Kiss,  looked  very  magnificent.  The 
old  Duke  and  Lord  Anglesey  walked  arm-in-arm,  which  was  a 
touching  sight.  We  returned  to  our  own  place,  and  Albert  told 
Lord  Breadalbane  to  declare  the  Exhibition  was  opened,  which 
he  did  in  a  loud  voice,  followed  by  a  flourish  of  trumpets  and  a 
tremendous  cheering.  The  Prince  and  Princess  of  Prussia  were 
quite  delighted  and  impressed.  That  we  felt  happy  —  thankful 


THE   GREAT  EXHIBITION.  23? 

—  I  need  not  say  ;  proud  of  all  that  had  passed,  of  my  dear  hus- 
band's success,  and  of  the  behavior  of  my  good  people.  I  was 
more  impressed  than  I  can  say  by  the  scene.  It  was  one  that 
never  can  be  effaced  from  my  memory,  and  never  will  be  from 
that  of  any  one  who  witnessed  it.  All  went  off  so  well,  and 
without  the  slightest  accident.  Albert's  emphatic  words  last 
year,  when  he  said  that  the  feeling  would  be  '  that  of  deep 
thankfulness  to  the  Almighty  for  the  blessings  which  He  has 
bestowed  upon  us  already  here  below,'  were  this  day  realized. 

"  I  must  not  omit  to  mention  an  interesting  episode  in  this 
day ;  viz.,  the  visit  of  the  good  old  Duke,  on  this  his  eighty- 
second  birthday,  to  his  little  godson,  our  dear  little  Arthur.  He 
came  to  see  us  at  five,  and  gave  him  a  golden  cup,  and  some 
toys  which  he  had  himself  chosen 

"  We  dined  en  famille,  and  then  went  to  Covent  Garden, 
where  we  saw  the  two  finest  acts  of  the  '  Huguenots,'  given  as 
beautifully  as  last  year.  I  was  rather  tired,  but  we  were  both  so 
happy,  —  so  full  of  thankfulness.  God  is  indeed  our  kind  and 
merciful  Father !  " 

The  Chinese  Mandarin,  to  whom  the  Queen  alludes,  was 
a  Chinese  in  full  costume,  who,  when  the  Hallelujah  Chorus 
was  being  performed,  made  his  way  slowly  round  the  great 
fountain  and  prostrated  himself  before  the  Queen. 

"  No  one  could  help  admiring  his  perfect  self-possession,  and 
nonchalance  of  manner.  He  talked  with  nobody,  yet  he  seemed 
perfectly  at  home,  and  on  friendly  terms  with  all  around  him. 
In  the  procession  the  ambassadors,  having  no  Chinese  repre- 
sentative among  them,  impounded  him  into  their  part  of  the 
procession,  where  he  bore  himself  with  a  steadiness  and  gravity 
that  made  him  well  become  his  situation." 

Among  Prince  Albert's  private  papers,  when  examined 
after  his  death,  was  found  a  newspaper  slip  from  the  "  Times  " 
containing  Thackeray's  noble  Ode  to  that  May  day.  I  have 
already  quoted  one  verse  from  it  about  the  magical  celerity 
with  which  the  glass  palace  was  raised.  Here  are  four  more 
verses,  recording  his  impressions  of  the  opening  of  the 
Exhibition :  — 


238    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  I  felt  a  thrill  of  love  and  awe 

To  mark  the  different  garb  of  each, 
The  changing  tongue,  the  various  speech 

Together  blent. 

A  thrill,  methinks,  like  his  who  saw 
All  people  dwelling  upon  earth 
Praising  our  God  with  solemn  mirth, 
And  one  consent  t 

"  Behold  her  in  her  royal  place, 

A  gentle  lady  ;  —  and  the  hand 
That  sways  the  sceptre  of  this  land 

How  frail  and  weak  ! 
Soft  is  the  voice,  and  fair  the  face  : 

She  breathes  Amen  to  prayer  and  hymn ; 
No  wonder  that  her  eyes  are  dim, 
And  pale  her  cheek. 

"  The  fountain  in  the  basin  plays, 

The  chanting  organ  echoes  clear, 
An  awful  chorus  't  is  to  hear 

A  wondrous  song ! 
Swell,  organ  !  swell  your  trumpet  blast ; 

March  Queen  and  royal  pageant,  march 
By  splendid  aisle  and  springing  arch 
Of  this  fair  Hall ! 

"  And  see  above  the  fabric  vast 

God's  boundless  heavens  are  bending  blue, 
God's  peaceful  sun  is  shining  through 
And  beaming  over  all !  " 

The  greatest  triumph  of  the  day  was  in  the  perfect  behavior 
of  the  people.  The  Home  Secretary  was  able  to  report  to 
the  Queen  the  next  morning  that  there  had  not  been  one 
police  case  among  the  crowd.  "  There  were  no  demonstra- 
tions of  Red  Republicans,  of  hostile  Chartists,  or  of  Irish 
agitators."  There  were  thirty  thousand  people  within  the 
building,  and  nearly  seven  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  people 
lined  the  streets  between  the  Exhibition  and  Buckingham 
Palace,  and  yet  the  police  met  with  no  single  instance  of 
trouble  in  the  crowd.  Lord  Palmerston  wrote  that  no  in- 
vited guests  in  a  lady's  drawing-room  could  have  conducted 
themselves  with  more  propriety  than  did  the  crowd  that 
day ;  and  this,  more  than  anything  else,  seems  to  have  im- 


-S7 A'   KOBERT  PEEL 


p 
ROBERT  PEEL.  239 

pressed  itself  on  foreigners.   Jules  Janin,  the  brilliant  French 
essayist  and  journalist,  wrote  of  the  scene  :  — 

"  The  English  are  a  most  strange  people  !  Always  calm, 
they  press  on;  but  they  do  so  within  certain  limits.  Their  very 
enthusiasm  is  patient.  They  do  not  like  to  be  governed,  but 
they  are  ready  to  govern  themselves ;  and  any  one  who  infringes 
established  order  is  seized  at  once  by  his  next  neighbor  and 
handed  over  to  a  policeman.  The  crowd  at  the  Crystal  Palace 
vanished  quietly  away.  At  three  o'clock  no  one  would  have 
supposed  that  thirty  thousand  persons,  eager  to  see  and  hear, 
had  been  that  morning  in  the  building." 

"  Nor,"  says  Justin  McCarthy,  "  did  the  subsequent  his- 
tory of  the  Exhibition  belie  the  promise  of  its  opening.  It 
continued  to  attract  delighted  crowds  to  the  last." 

In  an  industrial  and  educational  point  of  view  it  did  all, 
and  more  than  all,  that  had  been  hoped  from  it.  It  re- 
mained open  from  May  i  until  the  middle  of  October ;  and 
when  it  closed  there  was  a  surplus  fund,  wholly  unexpected 
by  the  Commissioners,  which  it  cost  them  much  anxious 
deliberation  to  dispose  of.  The  beautiful  building  of  glass 
and  iron  was,  as  we  all  know,  not  destroyed,  but  removed 
to  the  village  of  Sydenham,  where  it  is  now  one  of  the 
sights  of  London,  being  a  perfect  museum  of  interesting 
and  curious  things.  In  it  are  also  given  concerts  of  music 
of  the  highest  character. 

"The  years  1849  to  1851  had  seen  the  failure  of  many 
splendid  hopes,  and  the  deaths  of  many  illustrious  men." 
Among  these  were  Louis  Philippe  in  his  exile,  the  good 
Queen  Adelaide,  widow  of  William  IV.,  and  Louise,  Queen 
of  the  Belgians,  Queen  Victoria's  warm  personal  friend; 
but  the  noblest  prey  death  harvested  in  those  years  was 
Sir  Robert  Peel. 

A  brilliant  debate  had  taken  place  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons on  Lord  Palmerston's  manner  of  bullying  the  Greek 
Government,  on  behalf  of  a  Maltese  Jew,  Don  Pacifico, 
whose  house  had  been  plundered  at  Athens.  This  man 
claimed  protection  from  the  British  Government  as  a  British 
subject.  Lord  Palmerston  triumphed,  both  in  the  debate 


240    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

and  in  the  reparation  and  apology  he  forced  from  the 
Greek  Government.  The  debate  was  a  long  and  very 
brilliant  one,  lasting  till  four  o'clock  in  the  morning  of 
June  29,  1850.  Sir  Robert  Peel  made  on  that  occasion 
one  of  his  finest  speeches.  He  was  not  usually  a  great 
orator,  but  he  was  a  wonderful  debater.  Every  word  he 
said  was  well  considered,  and  carried  weight  with  all  par- 
ties in  the  House  of  Commons.1 

Leaving  the  House  after  four  o'clock  in  the  morning,  Sir 
Robert  went  home  to  take  a  little  sleep.  He  could  not 
have  slept  long,  for  at  mid-day  he  had  an  appointment  to 
attend  a  meeting  of  the  Exhibition  Commissioners  at  Buck- 
ingham Palace.  The  meeting  was  held  to  consider  means 
to  oppose  the  popular  clamor  against  erecting  the  building 
for  the  Exhibition  in  Hyde  Park.  After  the  meeting,  Sir 
Robert  went  home  to  lunch,  and  then  set  out  for  a  ride  in 
Hyde  Park.  He  was  riding  alone,  without  a  groom.  He 
called  first  at  Buckingham  Palace,  and  wrote  his  name  in 
the  Queen's  visiting-book.  He  had  not  proceeded  much 
farther,  when  he  paused  to  say  a  few  words  to  a  young  lady 
who  was  on  horseback.  After  she  rode  on,  his  horse  took 
fright  (it  is  believed  at  a  dog).  It  shied,  and  threw  him 
off.  Unhappily,  he  fell  clinging  to  the  bridle.  This  brought 
the  horse  down  on  its  knees,  directly  upon  the  breast  of  its 
master.  Sir  Robert  was  mortally  injured  internally.  He 
lingered  three  days,  delirious  most  of  the  time,  and  died 
July  2,  1850.  When  the  Duke  of  Wellington  announced 
his  death  in  the  House  of  Lords,  big  tears  ran  down  his 
cheeks.  "  In  all  the  course  of  my  acquaintance  with  Sir 
Robert  Peel,"  he  said,  "I  never  knew  a  man  in  whose 
truth  and  justice  I  had  more  lively  confidence,  or  in  whom 
I  saw  a  more  invariable  desire  to  promote  the  public  good. 
In  the  whole  course  of  my  communications  with  him,  I 
never  knew  an  instance  in  which  he  did  not  show  the 
strongest  attachment  to  truth ;  and  I  never  saw,  in  the 
whole  course  of  my  life,  the  slightest  reason  for  suspecting 

1  I  heard  him  speak  once  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  was 
impressed  by  his  calmness  and  dignity. 


SIR  ROBERT  PEEL.  241 

that  he  stated  anything  which  he  did  not  believe  to  be  the 
fact." 

Prince  Albert,  on  hearing  the  news  of  his  death,  wrote 
thus  to  his  friend  Stockmar  :  — 

"  You  will  mourn  with  us  deeply,  for  you  know  the  extent  of 
our  loss,  and  valued  our  friend  as  we  did.  You  will  have  heard 
that  Peel  fell  with,  or  rather  from,  his  horse  opposite  our  garden 
wall  last  Saturday,  and  broke  his  collar-bone  and  shoulder-blade. 
He  suffered  greatly,  and  was  worn  out  with  pain,  fever,  and  a 
gouty  constitution.  Only  a  few  hours  before  his  accident  he 
was  seated  with  us  in  the  Commission,  advising  us  as  to  the 
difficult  position  into  which  we  had  been  thrown  in  regard  to 
the  Exhibition,  by  the  refusal  to  allow  us  the  use  of  the  Park. 
The  debate  on  Palmerston  had  lasted  the  previous  night  until 
past  four  in  the  morning,  and  Peel  had  made  an  admirable 
speech,  —  now  he  is  cold.  We  are  in  deep  grief;  in  addition 
to  which  I  cannot  conceal  from  you  that  we  are  on  the  point  of 
having  to  abandon  the  Exhibition  altogether.  We  have  an- 
nounced our  intention  to  do  so  if,  on  the  day  the  vast  building 
ought  to  be  begun,  the  site  is  taken  from  us.  Peel  was  to 
have  taken  charge  of  the  business  in  the  Lower  House.  It  is 
to  come  to  a  vote  to-morrow,  and  the  public  is  inflamed  by  the 
newspapers  to  madness." 

Elsewhere  Prince  Albert  calls  Sir  Robert  Peel  "  the  best 
of  men,  our  truest  friend,  and  the  bulwark  of  the  throne." 

The  feeling  of  Englishmen  of  all  parties  when  they  heard 
of  Peel's  death  was  as  if  each  had  received  a  sudden  blow. 
I  remember  its  effect  upon  my  father  (then  in  America) 
and  on  myself.  We  could  not  believe  it  true.  From  the 
moment  of  his  accident  crowds  thronged  his  door,  to  whom 
a  bulletin  every  hour  was  read  by  a  policeman. 

As  soon  as  he  was  dead,  opposition  to  the  Exhibition  was 
withdrawn  in  Parliament.  It  was  known  that  he  had  had 
at  heart  that  the  building  should  be  erected  in  Hyde  Park, 
and,  with  tenderness  to  his  memory,  members  did  not  like 
to  vote  against  a  measure  he  was  to  have  advocated  in  the 
House  of  Commons. 

Sir  Robert  Peel  sprang,  as  it  were,  from  the  very  heart  of 
English  industry.  His  ancestors  had  been  yeomen  in  the 

16 


242    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

North  of  England.  His  father  and  grandfather,  though  not 
inventors  themselves,  were  men  who  took  up  and  applied 
inventions.  "  They  were,"  says  an  English  writer,  "  as 
manufacturers  what  their  descendant  was  as  a  statesman. 
Solid  worth,  integrity,  fortitude,  and  perseverance  marked 
the  manufacturing  career  of  the  Peels." 

Like  other  manufacturers,  they  had  great  difficulty  in 
introducing  machinery  into  cotton-weaving,  because  of  the 
opposition  of  the  weavers  in  hand-looms ;  but  the  change 
was  accomplished,  and  great  wealth  flowed  into  the  family. 
The  first  Sir  Robert,  the  manufacturer,  was  a  stanch  sup- 
porter of  Mr.  Pitt,  and  from  him  he  received  his  baro- 
netcy. Very  early  the  old  man  began  to  dream  of  political 
success  for  his  promising  son.  He  brought  up  his  boy 
in  the  principles  of  strong  conservatism,  a  Tory  of  the 
Tories ;  but  he  brought  him  up  also  in  a  religious  home, 
where  all  the  middle-class  virtues  of  Englishmen  were  culti- 
vated, —  where  labor  was  honored,  and  frugality,  even  in 
the  midst  of  wealth,  was  esteemed. 

Robert  Peel  went  to  Harrow  and  to  Oxford,  associating, 
in  virtue  of  his  wealth,  his  talents,  and  his  future  baronetcy, 
with  the  most  aristocratic  young  fellows  of  his  time.  He 
gained  the  highest  honors  Oxford  can  bestow,  —  taking  what 
is  called  a  "  Double  First ;  "  that  is,  he  took  a  degree  of  the 
first  class  in  both  classics  and  mathematics,  which  in  those 
days  was  almost  an  unprecedented  honor.  When  little  more 
than  twenty-one,  he  entered  Parliament,  and  at  the  age  of 
twenty-four  was  Secretary  for  Ireland. 

The  troubles  of  1798  had  hardly  died  out.  Ireland  was 
restless,  sullen,  and  discontented,  with  enormously  more 
reason  for  her  disaffection  and  discontent  than  she  has  ever 
had  in  our  own  day.  Corruption  and  force  were  the  two 
things  by  which  Lord  Castlereagh  governed  Ireland  ;  and  it  is 
creditable  to  Peel  that,  though  he  served  six  years  as  Irish 
Secretary,  he  was,  as  far  as  possible,  humane,  and  never 
was  accused  of  making  a  wrong  use  of  influence  or  money. 

Once  he  sent  a  challenge  to  O'Connell,  but  on  no  other 
occasion  was  he  known  to  lose  his  temper.  "He  never 
uttered  a  harsh  word  in  Parliament  against  the  Irish  or  against 


SIX  ROBERT  PEEL.  243 

their  religion,"  as  in  those  days  was  the  fashion ;  on  the  con- 
trary, he  spoke  of  them  as  a  nation  in  terms  of  respect  and 
kindness.  With  repression  he  tried  to  combine  measures  of 
improvement,  though  some  of  his  projects  failed.  It  is  true 
that  he  was  nicknamed  "Orange  Peel;  "  but  that  name  he 
seems  to  have  owed  less  to  his  Orange  proclivities  than  to 
the  irresistible  pun.  "  And,"  as  his  brief  biographer  adds, 
"  remember  that  at  this  time  he  was  but  twenty- four." 

By  temperament  he  was  nervous,  and  in  society  shy; 
but  in  the  administrative  details  of  business  no  man  could 
compare  with  him.  All  public  servants  who  wished  to  do 
their  duty,  for  a  quarter  of  a  century  looked  up  to  Peel  as 
their  leader  and  chief.  He  had  every  quality  requisite  in  a 
man  of  business,  —  patience,  perseverance,  and  good  judg- 
ment, —  besides  which  he  had  the  gift  of  public  speaking. 

Unhappily  he  was  so  identified  with  the  policy  of  Lord 
Castlereagh,  and  so  pledged  to  oppose  Catholic  Emancipa- 
tion, that  he  would  not  take  office  under  Mr.  Canning. 
His  objection  to  agitation  of  the  question  in  1822  was 
based  on  political  grounds,  and  not  on  religious  animosity. 
The  Catholic  Relief  claim  was  a  question  that  had  either 
divided  or  destroyed  every  government  in  England  since 
the  beginning  of  the  century.  So  long  as  George  III. 
reigned  any  allusion  to  the  subject  brought  back  his  in- 
sanity ;  and  the  royal  princes  were  strenuously  opposed  to 
the  measure,  partly  basing  their  dislike  to  it  on  regard  for 
the  feelings  of  their  father,  for  which,  on  other  matters, 
they  showed  little  concern.  After  Canning's  death  in  1827 
the  Wellington  and  Peel  Government  was  formed.  Peel 
had  already  deserved  well  of  his  country  for  using  his  busi- 
ness talents  to  bring  her  safely  through  a  commercial  crisis 
which  involved  perplexing  questions  of  currency. 

To  the  astonishment  and  chagrin  of  the  High  Tory  sup- 
porters of  this  Cabinet,  who  believed  Peel  and  the  Duke 
"  safe  —  more  than  safe  "  on  the  question  of  Catholic 
Emancipation,  they  took  up  the  measure  as  having  become 
one  of  political  expediency,  if  not  of  justice,  and  carried  it 
through  in  1829. 


244    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Next  came  the  question  of  Parliamentary  Reform.  Peel 
opposed  it,  and,  with  the  exception  of  one  brief  interval, 
was  excluded  from  office  for  ten  years,  during  which  time 
he  trained  and  formed  the  Conservative  Party.  Its  views 
might  be  narrow,  but  its  principles  were  high.  Peel  led 
the  aristocracy  of  England,  but,  as  we  can  see  in  Greville's 
Memoirs,  he  never  was  personally  a  favorite  in  society.  He 
was  not  genial  in  manner,  and  he  was  essentially  a  man 
of  the  middle  classes ;  but  every  one  acknowledged  that  he 
was  the  most  able  administrator  among  English  statesmen. 

At  last  Peel's  time  of  power  came.  He  took  office  in 
1841,  with  the  young  Queen  thoroughly  disliking  him;  but 
in  a  few  months  he  had  won  her  confidence,  and  in  a  short 
time  her  love. 

"  His  government  was  a  thoroughly  good  government  in 
every  respect,"  says  a  political  opponent.  "  It  was  trusted 
at  home,  and  respected  by  foreign  nations."  But  the  Irish 
famine  in  1845  made  necessary  a  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws. 
Foreign  wheat  paid  heavy  duties  if  admitted  into  England ; 
the  old-fashioned  policy  having  been  to  make  English  farm- 
ers produce  all  breadstuff's  eaten  by  the  English  population. 
Peel  felt  that  the  maintenance  of  this  system  was  no  longer 
possible,  and  that  cheap  bread,  even  with  a  diminution  of  the 
farmer's  profits,  must  be  furnished  to  the  working-classes. 

Those  of  the  present  generation,  even  in  England,  can 
have  no  idea  of  the  rage  and  horror  excited  among  the 
gentry  and  farmers  throughout  Great  Britain  when  Peel  and 
the  Duke  of  Wellington  proposed  a  repeal  of  the  Corn 
Laws.  It  was  treachery ;  it  was  duplicity.  It  would  ruin 
every  gentleman  who  owned  land  in  England,  and  every 
farmer  who  held  his  leases.  That  Peel  should  have  led  his 
Conservative  Party  to  this  !  That  the  Duke  should  betray 
and  ruin  them  ! 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  the  agricultural  interest  in  Eng- 
land has  ever  since  suffered  progressively ;  but  the  measure 
had  become  one  that  could  not  be  evaded.  Some  one  once 
said,  when  Peel  was  being  taxed  with  ingratitude  and  treach- 
ery to  his  party,  that  Moses  might  as  well  have  been  taxed 


SIR  ROBERT  PEEL.  245 

with  ingratitude  and  treachery  by  the  Israelites  for  bringing 
them  safely  through  the  Red  Sea. 

However,  the  Tories  had  it  in  their  power  to  punish  him 
for  his  revolt.  The  day  he  carried  his  measure  through  the 
House  of  Commons  the  High  Tories  combined  with  the 
Whig  Party  against  the  Conservative  Ministry,  and  by  an 
adverse  vote  upon  some  petty  question  overthrew  the 
Cabinet. 

It  was  then  that  Prince  Albert  expressed  to  Sir  Robert 
the  hope  that  his  quitting  office  would  not  interrupt  other 
friendly  relations  between  them ;  and  Sir  Robert  replied  as 
follows :  *  — 

"  I  may  say,  I  hope  without  presumption,  —  I  am  sure  with 
perfect  sincerity,  —  that  cessation  of  every  sort  of  communica- 
tion with  your  Royal  Highness  would  be  a  very  severe  penalty. 
It  was  only  yesterday  that  I  was  separating  from  the  rest  of  my 
correspondence  all  the  letters  which  I  have  received  from  the 
Queen  and  your  Royal  Highness  during  the  long  period  of  five 
years,  in  order  that  I  might  ensure  their  exemption  from  the 
fate  to  which,  in  these  days,  all  letters  (however  confidential) 
seem  to  be  destined,  and  I  could  not  review  them  without  a 
mixed  feeling  of  gratitude  for  the  considerate  indulgence  and 
kindness,  of  which  they  contain  such  decisive  proofs,  and  of 
regret  that  such  a  source  of  interest  and  pleasure  was  dried  up. 
I  can,  in  conformity  with  your  Royal  Highness'  gracious  wishes, 
and  occasionally,  write  to  you,  without  saying  a  word  of  which 
the  most  jealous  or  sensitive  successor  in  the  confidence  of  the 
Queen  could  complain."  2 

"  Had  Peel's  government  lasted,"  says  Professor  Goldwin 
Smith,  "  it  would  have  taught  the  nation  a  wholesome  lesson  of 
loyalty  to  a  truly  national  government.  His  government  was,  in 

1  There  is  in  the  letter  a  little  of  that  dignified  stiffness  which 
characterized  the  letters  of  Edward  Everett,  and  their  beautiful  hand- 
writings closely  resembled  each  other. 

2  It  was  during  the  Oregon  dispute  with  this  country  in  1845,  that 
my  father  had  several  interviews  with  Sir  Robert  Peel,  and  from  being 
his  political  opponent  for  many  years,  became  his  warm  admirer.     I 
have  several  of  his  letters.     He  had  been  anxious  to  see  some  one 
who  could  collect  for  him  American  views  and  documents  on  the 
boundary  of  Oregon,  and  my  father  did  his  best  to  put  such  views  and 
documents  into  his  hands. 


246    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

fact,  rapidly  attaining  this  national  position,  when  it  became 
entangled  in  the  fatal  difficulties  of  the  Corn  Laws,  and  fell  a 
sacrifice  to  animosity  and  intrigue." 

"  Sir  Rob,ert  Peel  is  to  be  buried  to-day,"  writes  Prince 
Albert,  on  July  9,  1850.  "The  feeling  in  the  country  is  ab- 
solutely not  to  be  described.  We  have  lost  our  truest  and 
trusted  counsellor."  And  the  Queen  writes  the  same  day 
to  her  uncle  :  "  The  sorrow  and  grief  at  his  death  are  most 
touching.  Every  one  seems  to  have  lost  a  personal  friend." 

He  left  a  will  enjoining  his  family  to  let  his  funeral  be  of 
the  simplest  kind.  He  was  buried,  therefore,  in  his  parish 
church,  beside  his  father  and  mother.  His  goffin  was  borne 
to  the  grave  by  workmen  from  his  factories. 

Parliament  had  greatly  desired  to  give  him  a  public 
,  funeral  in  Westminster  Abbey ;  but  as  this  was  precluded 
by  his  will,  all  that  could  be  done  was  to  place  a  monu- 
ment there.  Another  wish  he  had  expressed  was  that  none 
of  his  family,  on  account  of  his  services,  should  seek,  or 
even  accept,  a  Peerage.  Before  this  was  known,  Lord  John 
Russell,  then  Prime  Minister,  and  his  life-long  political  op- 
ponent, had  carried  out  the  wishes  of  the  country  by  offer- 
ing a  Peerage  to  Lady  Peel,  with  remainder  to  her  sons ; 
but  she  answered  that  it  was  her  desire  to  bear  no  name  but 
that  of  her  husband,  besides  which  his  expressed  wish  had 
been  that  none  of  his  family,  for  his  sake,  should  accept 
any  distinction  or  reward. 

A  few  months  more  and  another  death  saddened  all 
England,  yet  not  as  Peel's  had  done ;  for  it  could  not  have 
been  otherwise  than  expected.  The  old  Duke  —  the  Duke, 
for  few  called  him  otherwise  than  by  that  name  —  was  in 
his  eighty- fourth  year.  He  had  been  failing  for  some  time, 
both  in  body  and  mind  ;  yet  failure  in  the  latter  was  per- 
ceptible only  to  people  immediately  around  him.  On  great 
occasions  he  would  gather  himself  up  with  an  effort,  and  his 
mind  would  be  as  clear  as  ever.  He  was  a  man  whose  life 
motto  had  been  duty,  whose  supreme  thought  was  how  he 
might  best  serve  England,  —  whether  by  his  life,  his  death, 


THE  DUKE   OF  WELLINGTON.  247 

the  sacrifice  of  his  prejudices,  or  by  his  popularity.  And 
now  in  the  month  of  September,  1852,  on  the  eve  of  the 
breaking  out  of  the  Crimean  War,  he  lay  dying  calmly  at 
his  residence  at  Walmer  Castle,  where  he  lived  as  Warden 
of  the  Cinque  Ports,  near  Dover.  There  Prince  Albert  had 
paid  him  a  flying  visit  only  a  few  days  before. 

"  What  the  country  has  lost  in  him,  and  what  we  have 
personally  lost,"  the  Prince  writes,  "  it  is  impossible  to  esti- 
mate. It  is  as  if  in  a  tissue  a  particular  thread  had  been 
woven  into  every  pattern."  And  the  Queen  writes  to  King 
Leopold :  "  He  was  the  pride  and  good  genius  as  it  were 
of  this  country,  the  most  loyal  and  devoted  subject,  and  the 
stanchest  supporter  that  the  Crown  ever  had.  He  was  to 
us  a  true  friend  and  a  most  valuable  adviser.  We  shall 
soon  stand  alone  ;  Peel,  Melbourne,  Liverpool  —  now  the 
Duke  —  all  gone  !  Albert  is  much  grieved.  The  Duke 
showed  him  great  confidence  and  affection." 

The  Duke,  indeed,  about  eighteen  months  before  his 
death,  had  been  anxious  to  resign  his  post  as  Commander- 
in-Chief  in  Prince  Albert's  favor ;  but  with  that  rare  self- 
effacement  that  distinguished  the  Prince,  he  thought  it  wise 
to  decline  such  an  appointment,  writing  a  letter  on  the  sub- 
ject to  the  Duke,  which  I  will  quote  hereafter.  Baron 
Stockmar,  writing  about  the  Duke's  death  to  the  Prince, 
speaks  of  "  his  patriotic  fidelity  which  never  wavered ;  " 
and  the  Prince,  replying,  says  :  "  That  feature  of  his  charac- 
ter —  to  set  the  fulfilment  of  duty  before  all  other  con- 
siderations, and  in  fulfilling  it  to  fear  neither  death  nor  the 
devil  —  we  ought  certainly  to  be  able  to  imitate,  if  we  set 
our  minds  to  the  task." 

The  Duke  died  on  the  i4th  of  September,  but  his  funeral 
was  postponed  till  Parliament  could  meet  early  in  Novem- 
ber, and  the  public  funeral  be  accorded  by  the  people  of 
England  as  well  as  by  the  Sovereign. 

This  funeral  took  place  November  18,  1852.  The 
Duke  was  buried  in  St.  Paul's  Cathedral,  beside  Lord  Nel- 
son, —  the  greatest  naval  and  the  greatest  military  English 
heroes. 


248    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY, 

The  day  was  gray  and  bleak,  but  more  than  a  million  of 
spectators  were  waiting  patiently  in  the  streets  to  do  the  hero 
honor.  Every  nationality  sent  its  representative,  except 
Austria.  Wellington  was  a  Field- Marshal  in  the  Austrian 
service ;  but,  in  revenge  for  the  beating  General  Haynau 
had  received  two  years  before  from  the  London  populace, 
Austria  did  not  choose  to  honor  his  remains.  The  omission 
hurt  nobody  in  England  ;  but  the  Queen  said  to  her  uncle  : 
"  There  is  but  one  feeling  of  indignation  and  surprise  at 
the  conduct  of  Austria  in  taking  this  opportunity  to  slight 
England  in  return  for  what  happened  to  Haynau  on  account 
of  his  own  character." 

Count  Walewski  (son  of  the  great  Napoleon  by  the  un- 
happy Polish  Countess  Walewska)  was  ambassador  in  Lon- 
don at  this  time,  and  wrote  to  ask  Napoleon  III.  if  he 
wished  him  to  attend  the  Duke  of  Wellington's  funeral. 
"  Certainly,"  was  the  reply.  "  I  wish  we  may  forget  the 
past.  I  have  every  reason  to  be  grateful  for  the  friendly 
terms  in  which  the  Duke  spoke  of  me  ;  and  I  wish  to  con- 
tinue on  the  most  friendly  terms  with  England." 

The  presence  of  the  French  ambassador  was  felt  by  all 
Englishmen  to  be  a  great  and  touching  tribute  to  the 
memory  of  their  hero  and  statesman. 

The  procession  was  magnificent.  The  tributes  of  respect 
and  personal  grief  were  very  touching.  The  crowd  showed 
deep  feeling  and  respect ;  not  a  sound,  as  the  cortege  passed, 
was  heard. 

"  Honor,  my  Lords,"  said  Lord  Derby,  in  the  House  of 
Peers,  "all  honor  to  the  people  who  so  well  knew  how  to 
reverence  the  illustrious  dead.  Honor  to  the  friendly  visitors, 
—  especially  to  France,  that  great  and  friendly  nation,  —  that 
testified,  by  their  representatives,  their  respect  and  veneration 
for  his  memory  !  The  French  people  regarded  him  as  a  foe 
worthy  of  their  steel.  His  object  was  not  fame  or  glory,  but  a 
lasting  peace.  We  have  buried,  in  our  greatest  hero,  the  man 
among  us  who  had  the  greatest  horror  of  war." 

We  all  know  the  Duke's  answer  to  the  lady  who  said 
to  him,  "  Oh,  how  splendid  it  must  be  to  see  a  vie- 


BARON  STOCKMAR.  24$ 

tory  !  "  —  "  Madam,  I  know  nothing  more  horrible  except 
a  defeat !  " 

"  When  Lord  John  Russell  visited  Napoleon  in  Elba,  in 
1813,"  says  Justin  McCarthy,  "the  Emperor  asked  him  whether 
he  thought  the  Duke  of  Wellington  would  be  able  to  live 
thenceforward  without  the  excitement  of  war  ?  It  was  probably 
in  Napoleon's  mind  that  the  English  soldier  would  be  con- 
stantly entangling  England  in  foreign  complications  for  the 
sake  of  gratifying  his  love  for  the  'brave  squares  of  war.'  Lord 
John  endeavored  to  impress  on  the  great  fallen  Emperor  that 
the  Duke  of  Wellington  would,  as  a  matter  of  course,  lapse  into 
the  place  of  a  simple  citizen,  and  would  look  with  no  manner 
of  regret  to  the  stormy  days  of  battle.  Xapoleon  seems  to  have 
listened  with  a  sort  of  incredulity,  and  only  observed  once  or 
twice  that  'it  was  a  splendid  game  —  was  war.'  •' 

To  Wellington  it  was  no  "splendid  game,"-— no  game 
of  any  sort.  It  was  a  stern  duty,  to  be  done  for  his  sove- 
reign and  his  country,  and  to  be  got  through  as  quickly 
as  possible.  The  difference  between  the  two  men  cannot 
be  better  illustrated. 

Tennyson,  as  poet  laureate,  wrote  one  of  his  grand  odes 
on  so  national  an  event  as  the  Duke  of  Wellington's 
funeral ;  but  Longfellow's  "  Warden  of  the  Cinque  Ports  " 
stirs  our  hearts,  I  think,  with  more  sympathetic  emotion. 

Before  I  conclude  this  chapter,  I  should  like  to  say  a 
few  words  about  Baron  Stockmar,  whose  name  has  so  fre- 
quently occurred  in  it  and  in  former  chapters. 

Christian  Frederick  Stockmar  was  born  at  Coburg  in 
1787.  He  was  a  physician  by  profession,  and,  as  such, 
came  to  the  notice  of  Prince  Leopold,  who,  when  he  went 
over  to  England  to  be  married  in  1816,  offered  him  the 
post  of  his  private  physician.  Private  physicians  were, 
in  those  days,  frequently  the  counsellors  of  princes  and 
kings. 

Stockmar  was  part  of  the  Prince's  household  during  his 
eighteen  months  of  married  life.  It  was  he  who  had  to 
announce  to  him  poor  Princess  Charlotte's  death;  and 


250    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

it  was  at  that  moment,  kneeling  by  his  dead  wife's  bedside, 
in  utter  forlornness,  that  Leopold  obtained  a  promise  from 
Stockmar  never  to  leave  him.  From  that  day  forth,  Stock- 
mar's  life  was  consecrated  to  Leopold,  —  to  him  and  to 
his.  In  the  negotiations  respecting  the  crowns  of  Greece 
and  Belgium,  he  was  his  friend's  confidential  adviser.  The 
business  of  his  life  was  to  see  and  reflect,  consider  and 
advise. 

In  1837,  the  year  that  Queen  Victoria  ascended  the 
throne,  Stockmar  was  intrusted  by  King  Leopold  with 
the  most  delicate  mission  possible.  He  was  to  go  to  Eng- 
land, and  act  as  an  unseen  monitor  to  the  Queen,  King 
Leopold's  niece,  in  whom  he  took  a  double  interest,  from 
the  fact  that  in  her  seemed  to  revive  her  cousin  Charlotte, 
and  that  the  man  whom  she  might  marry  would  be  the 
inheritor  of  his  early  dreams. 

Stockmar  unweariedly  concentrated  all  his  efforts  on  in- 
stilling into  the  mind  of  the  youthful  Queen  the  principles  of 
absolute  constitutional  impartiality ;  the  necessity  that  the 
sovereign  of  England  should  not  become  personally  identi- 
fied with  either  of  the  two  parties  whose  leaders  might  be 
called  into  her  service.  At  the  same  time  he  was  to  keep 
her  in  mind  of  the  suit  of  her  cousin  Albert,  whose  edu- 
cation Uncle  Leopold  had  been  directing  with  a  view  to 
the  position  he  would  occupy  if  she  gave  him  her  hand. 

Stockmar  had  no  ostensible  employment  in  the  royal 
household  after  the  marriage  of  his  proteges,  or  did  he  ever 
acquire  wealth,  or  touch  one  penny  of  English  money,  but 
he  went  in  and  out  amongst  them  as  one  of  themselves,  dis- 
pensed even  from  wearing  court  dress,  consulted  about 
everything,  —  from  the  management  of  the  nursery  and  the 
health  of  the  children  to  the  highest  affairs  of  State.  One 
of  the  ministers  called  him  "  a  second  father  "  to  the  Prince 
and  Queen.  He  was  indeed  Uncle  Leopold  by  proxy. 

He  had  no  scruple  in  scolding  the  Prince,  and  lecturing 
him  at  somewhat  tedious  length  ;  and  Prince  Albert  took  it 
all,  as  few  sons  would  take  admonitions  from  their  fathers, 
especially  as  there  were  times  (notably  relating  to  German 


BARON  STOCKMAR.  251 

politics)  when  the  royal  patrons  he  lectured  with  calm 
superiority  were  right,  and  he  was  wrong. 

"  He  was,"  says  a  writer  of  contemporary  memoirs,  "  an  active, 
decided,  slender,  rather  little  man,  with  a  compact  head,  brown 
hair  streaked  with  gray,  a  bold  short  nose,  firm  yet  full  mouth  ; 
and  what  gave  a  peculiar  air  of  animation  to  his  face  were  two 
youthful,  flashing  brown  eyes,  full  of  roguish  intelligence  and 
fiery  provocation.  With  this  exterior  the  style  of  his  demeanor 
and  conversation  corresponded,  —  bold,  bright,  pungent,  eager, 
full  of  thought,  —  so  that  amid  all  the  babbling  copiousness  and 
easy  vivacity  of  his  talk  a  certain  purpose  in  his  remarks  and 
illustrations  was  never  lost  sight  of." 

In  1857  he  took  his  farewell  of  the  English  court,  where 
he  had  lived  for  twenty  years,  "  the  beloved  and  trusted 
friend,"  writes  the  Queen,  "  of  all  beneath  our  roof,  down 
to  the  humblest  member  of  our  household."  In  vain  did 
the  letters  of  the  Queen  and  Prince  implore  him  to  return 
to  them,  — 

"Come  back,  come  back,  they  cried  with  grief,  " 

but  Stockmar  adhered  to  his  resolution.  Writing  to  King 
Leopold  to  resign  the  trust  he  had  filled  for  twenty  years 
with  rare  unselfishness,  he  says  :  — 

"  This  year  I  shall  be  seventy,  and  I  am  no  longer,  either 
physically  or  mentally,  equal  to  the  laborious  and  exhausting 
functions  of  a  paternal  friend  and  experienced  father  confessor. 
I  must  say  good-bye  ;  and  this  time  forever.  The  law  of  nature 
will  have  it  so ;  and  well  for  me  that  I  can  do  this  with  a  clear 
conscience,  for  I  have  worked  as  long  as  I  had  power  to  work, 
for  ends  that  cannot  be  impugned.  The  consciousness  of  this 
is  alone  the  reward  which  I  was  anxious  to  deserve ;  and  my  dear 
master  and  friend  gives  me  frankly  and  spontaneously,  from  the 
bottom  of  his  heart,  the  testimony  that  I  have  deserved  it." 

Stockmar  died  two  years  after  the  Prince  he  had  trained 
for  his  life  work,  and  whom  he  loved  "  so  fatherly."  The 
Prince  Consort,  only  a  month  before  he  died,  had  written  : 
"  I  am  terribly  in  want  of  a  friend  and  counsellor,  and  that 
you  are  that  friend  you  can  understand." 


252    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

It  is  sad  to  think  that  for  the  five  years  Stockmar  lived 
after  his  retirement  he  was 'not  happy.  Possibly,  the  strain 
upon  his  faculties  being  taken  off,  he  was  left  open  to 
attacks  of  depression ;  but  such  moods  were  only  the  pass- 
ing clouds  that  obscured  the  brightness  and  trustfulness  of 
his  serene  and  hopeful  nature.  "  Some  people  thought  him 
cold.  They  did  not  know  his  loving  nature,  his  sweet  tem- 
per, his  self-devoting  unselfishness,  his  consecration  to  the 
service  of  his  friends.  The  hearts  of  all  could  safely  trust 
in  him,  and  all  who  came  in  contact  with  him  felt  it  to 
be  so." 

He  said  in  his  old  age  :  — 

"  If  any  young  man  were  to  ask  me,  '  What  is  the  chief  good 
for  which  it  behoves  man  to  try  ? '  I  would  say,  '  Love  and 
Friendship.'  If  he  asked,  '  What  is  man's  best  possession  ? '  I 
must  answer,  'The  consciousness  of  having  loved  and  sought 
the  truth,  of  having  yearned  after  what  is  good  for  its  own  sake.'  " 

He  said  of  himself:  — 

"The  singularity  of  my  position  required  me  anxiously  to 
efface  myself,  and  to  conceal,  as  though  it  were  a  crime,  the  best 
purposes  I  had  in  view,  and  frequently  carried  out.  Like  a  thief 
in  the  night,  I  placed  with  liberal  hand  the  seed  within  the  earth, 
and  when  the  plant  grew  up,  and  became  visible  to  other  people, 
it  was  my  duty  to  ascribe  the  merit  to  others,  and  no  other  course 
was  open  to  me." 

This  lesson  of  self-effacement  he  impressed  upon  his 
pupil.  This  is  how  Prince  Albert  speaks  of  his  own 
position  in  England,  in  a  letter  he  wrote  to  the  Duke 
of  Wellington,  refusing  his  offer  to  resign  to  him  the  posi- 
tion of  British  Commander-in-Chief.  It  seems  an  echo 
of  Stockmar :  — 

"  The  husband  of  a  female  sovereign  should  entirely  sink  his 
own  individual  existence  in  that  of  his  wife :  he  should  aim 
at  no  power  by  himself  or  for  himself ;  should  shun  all  con- 
tention ;  assume  no  separate  responsibility  before  the  public ; 
but  make  his  position  entirely  a  part  of  hers,  —  fill  up  every 
gap  which,  as  a  woman,  she  would  naturally  leave,  in  the  exer- 


BARON  STOCKMAR.  .253 

cise  of  her  royal  functions ;  continually  and  anxiously  watch 
every  part  of  the  public  business,  in  order  to  be  able  to  advise 
and  assist  her  at  any  moment  in  any  of  the  multifarious  difficult 
questions  or  duties  brought  before  her,  sometimes  international, 
sometimes  political,  social,  or  personal.  As  the  natural  head  of 
her  family,  superintendent  of  her  household,  manager  of  her 
private  affairs,  sole  confidential  adviser  in  politics,  and  only 
assistant  in  her  communications  with  the  officers  of  the  Govern- 
ment, he  is,  besides  the  husband  of  the  Queen,  the  tutor  of  the 
royal  children,  the  private  secretary  of  the  Sovereign,  and  her 
permanent  minister." 

If  any  man  ever  carried  out  his  theories  in  his  life-work, 
it  was  Prince  Albert,  —  the  Prince  Consort.  And  when 
we  think  of  his  life,  and  mourn  over  his  early  death,  it  is 
not  alone  for  the  widowed  Queen  we  feel  regret,  but  for 
his  adopted  country.  "  Albert  the  Good  "  she  calls  him 
now,  after  having  subjected  him  to  many  mistrusts  and 
humiliations  during  his  lifetime.  As  one  thinks  of  his 
career,  one  cannot  but  remember  that  saying  of  Him 
"who  took  upon  Him  the  form  of  a  servant"  :  "  He  that 
is  chief  is  he  that  doth  serve." 


CHAPTER  X. 

THE    INDIAN    MUTINY. 

T  T  was  when  the  most  sagacious  of  English  statesmen  and 
•*•  the  greatest  military  commander  of  England  had 
recently  died  that  a  little  cloud  rose  out  of  the  East,  and, 
before  long,  overspread  all  Europe,  darkening  the  earth 
with  a  furious  storm.  England,  which  for  forty  years 
had  enjoyed  peace,  plunged  recklessly  and  almost  joy- 
ously into  a  dangerous  and  distant  war. 

I  have  told  the  story  of  the  Crimean  campaigns  in  two 
long  chapters  in  "  Russia  and  Turkey  in  the  Nineteenth 
Century."  I  therefore  shall  not  repeat  it  here.1 

Lord  Aberdeen  was,  when  the  war  broke  out,  the  Queen's 
Prime  Minister.  Lord  Palmerston  was  in  the  Home  Office. 
Lord  John  Russell  had  given  place  to  Lord  Clarendon,  who 
was  at  the  head  of  Foreign  Affairs. 

The  war  was  intensely  popular  in  England.  It  seemed 
to  many  to  renew  the  nation's  youth ;  to  burnish  up 
men's  patriotism ;  to  add  another  page  to  the  traditions  of 
their  fathers.  The  French  were  not  equally  enthusiastic. 
The  war  was  not  with  them  a  national  movement.  They 
entered  into  it  as  part  of  their  Emperor's  policy.  But 
in  England,  Lord  Palmerston,  boyish,  prejudiced,  and 
impulsive,  led  English  sentiment  on  the  occasion ;  and, 
although  he  was  no  longer  at  the  Foreign  Office,  may  be 
said  to  have  inspired  its  policy,  if  he  did  not  conduct 
its  affairs.  He  thought  that  English  interests  demanded 

1  Other  very  interesting  episodes  in  English  history  during  the 
last  half-century  have  had  to  be  omitted  in  this  volume,  but  I  hope  to 
continue  this  series  with  another  volume  entitled  "Europe  in  Africa 
during  the  Nineteenth  Century."  —  AUTHOR. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY. 

that  a  check  should  be  put  on  the  aggressiveness  of 
Russia;  he  was  the  friend  of  Turks,  but  he  detested 
Greeks  and  Russians.  His  sympathies  were  all  upon 
one  side,  and  the  populace  gave  him  their  voices.  He 
treated  all  stories  of  the  oppression  of  Christian  popu- 
lations in  Turkey  as  humbug,  —  false  rumors  raised  by 
Russia  to  support  her  claims. 

The  English  nation  was  carried  off  its  feet  on  a  great 
wave  of  enthusiasm.  From  the  day  when  it  opened  the 
doors  of  its  Temple  of  Janus,  on  February  21,  1854,  when 
the  British  ambassador  left  St.  Petersburg  (and  his  depar- 
ture was  followed  a  month  later  by  a  declaration  of  war), 
there  has  scarcely  been  a  period  of  even  a  few  months  when 
England  has  not  had  some  fighting  on  her  hands.  Many 
of  her  contests  have  been  "  little  wars  "  in  Africa ;  but  the 
one  most  memorable,  most  terrible,  is  the  subject  of  this 
and  the  succeeding  chapter,  —  the  Indian  or,  more  prop- 
erly, the  Poorbeah  Mutiny ;  for  it  happily  never  spread  over 
all  India,  and  did  not  extend  to  the  Presidencies  of  Madras 
and  Bombay. 

I  shared,  in  1840  and  1841,  in  the  excitement  produced 
in  England  by  Macaulay's  articles  on  Warren  Hastings  and 
Lord  Clive  in  the  "  Edinburgh  Review."  All  who  have 
read  those  articles  know  that  the  British  East  India  Com- 
pany was  chartered  in  the  time  of  Queen  Elizabeth  ;  that 
in  1634  it  obtained  certain  treaty  rights  from  the  Mogul 
which  enabled  it  to  establish  a  trading-post,  or  "  factory," 
on  the  Hoogly  in  Bengal,  where,  a  few  years  later,  it  built 
Fort  William,  called  after  William  III.  We  know  also  the 
story  of  Soorajah  Dowla  and  the  Black  Hole  of  Calcutta, 
where  one  hundred  and  forty-six  Europeans  were  confined 
during  a  hot  summer  night,  and  only  twenty-three  sur- 
vived till  morning.  After  this,  the  British  Company,  for  its 
own  security,  found  it  necessary  to  extend  its  territory  in 
India ;  each  acquisition  led  on  to  another,  and  bit  by  bit 
the  mighty  empire  grew. 

We  all  know  the  triangle  presented  on  the  map  by  the 
peninsula  of  Hindoostan.  The  southern  part  of  that  penin- 


256    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

sula  is  the  Presidency  of  Madras,  the  western  side  the 
Presidency  of  Bombay,  while  the  Presidency  of  Bengal  may 
be  loosely  said  to  occupy  the  centre  and  northeast  of  the 
peninsula.  Through  it  flow  the  Ganges  and  the  Jumna ; 
it  includes  what  were  once  the  dominions  of  the  Great 
Mogul.  Its  chief  city  is  Calcutta,  but  the  great  cities  of 
Delhi,  Benares,  and  Agra  are  in  it,  too;  there,  also,  is 
Cawnpore,  so  famous  in  the  Mutiny. 

The  Mutiny  was  confined  to  Bengal  and  to  the  recently 
annexed  kingdom  of  Oude,  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Ganges. 
Happily,  it  was  not  joined  by  the  recently  acquired  prov- 
inces of  the  Punjaub,  conquered  by  the  English  barely  ten 
years  before.  All  the  chiefs  of  the  Punjaub  remained 
faithful  to  the  English,  and  nearly  all  the  Sikh  Sepoys ; 
and  the  best  help  the  British  had  in  their  extremity  was 
from  regiments  raised  in  the  Punjaub,  in  which  their  former 
gallant  foes,  the  Sikhs,  fought  on  their  side. 

Since  the  Mutiny  the  charter  of  the  East  India  Company 
has  been  revoked.  The  Queen  is  Empress  of  India.  But 
it  may  be  useful  to  give  a  brief  sketch  of  the  Company 
before  its  sovereignty  passed  away. 

The  government  of  British  India  was  divided  between 
two  authorities,  —  the  one  controlling,  the  other  executive. 
The  controlling  power  was  in  England,  and  consisted  of 
the  King's  Government  and  the  Directors  of  the  East  India 
Company  in  Leadenhall  Street.  These  Directors  were 
twenty-four  in  number,  chosen  from  the  stockholders ;  and 
with  them  lay  all  appointments  except  those  of  the  Gover- 
nor-General (who  was  supreme  head  over  the  three  Presi- 
dencies) and  Commander-in-Chief.  The  Company  had  its 
own  fleet  of  Indiamen,  well  armed,  and  its  officers  were  all 
uniformed ;  it  had  also  its  own  army,  both  of  Europeans 
and  Native  troops,  the  latter  called  Sepoys.  They  were 
officered  by  Englishmen,  and  Englishmen  administered  the 
criminal  and  revenue  laws. 

The  population  of  British  India  at  the  time  of  the  Mutiny 
was  estimated  at  nearly  two  hundred  millions,  of  whom 
about  one  in  ten  were  Mohammedans.  The  Sepoy  force 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY. 

was  composed  both  of  Hindoos  and  Mohammedans,  —  the 
Hindoos  in  the  army  of  Bengal  being  almost  exclusively  of 
high  caste,  either  soldiers  by  race,  or  Brahmins.  Caste  is 
far  dearer  to  a  Hindoo  than  his  religion.  Of  religious  doc- 
trine he  makes  small  account,  but  death  is  to  be  preferred 
to  loss  of  caste  ;  and,  unhappily,  caste  may  be  lost  in  so 
many  ways  that  he  has  to  be  careful  about  everything.1 

The  state  of  Hindoostan,  when  the  English  planted  their 
empire  there,  might  be  compared  in  some  respects  to  that 
of  England  a  century  after  the  Norman  Conquest,  —  the 
Normans  being  represented  by  the  Mohammedans,  the  Sax- 
ons by  the  Hindoos.  The  Saxons  and  Normans,  however, 
intermarried,  and  were  of  the  same  religion,  which  Hindoos 
and  Mohammedans  were  not.  So  far  from  supplanting 
the  ancient  and  legitimate  rulers  of  India,  it  is  matter  of 
history  that  no  such  powers  existed  when  the  English  rule 
began. 

From  the  tenth  to  the  twelfth  century  the  Mohammedans 
were  robbers  and  spoilers,  overrunning  India  from  the 
North.  About  1200,  a  Mohammedan  kingdom  was  set  up 
at  Delhi,  under  Afghan  rulers,  whose  dominion  was  charac- 
terized by  blood  and  flame.  At  last  came  Tamerlane,  who 
in  1398  killed  one  hundred  thousand  Hindoo  prisoners  in 
cold  blood  under  the  walls  of  Delhi,  and  gave  the  city  up 
to  massacre  and  pillage.  Then  for  three  hundred  years 
there  was  a  kind  of  general  anarchy  in  India,  till  Aurung- 
zebe  established  himself  in  Delhi  about  the  same  time  that 
the  English  built  Fort  William  at  Calcutta.  He  was  a  great 
man  and  a  very  interesting  one ;  but  the  chief  object  of 
his  life  was  to  put  down  Hindoo  idolatry  and  to  persecute 
its  followers.  Aurungzebe  was  the  Great  Mogul.  He  not 

1  An  anecdote  is  told  of  an  English  gentleman  recently  arrived  in 
India,  who,  going  up  the  Ganges,  beheld  an  aged  native  lying  ex- 
hausied  on  the  bank.  He  lifted  him  up  and  poured  down  his  throat 
some  eau  de  cologne,  the  only  alcoholic  stimulant  he  had  at  hand. 
The  man  revived.  But  by  partaking  of  anything  from  the  hand  of  an 
infidel  he  had  lost  caste,  and  thenceforward  the  unhappy  Englishman, 
wherever  he  might  be,  was  solemnly  cursed  by  him  several  times  a 
week,  because  by  his  means  he  had  lost  caste  against  his  will. 

17 


258    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

only  governed  his  own  empire,  but  was  suzerain  of  a  good 
many  princes  round  him,  —  among  others  the  Prince  who 
governed  Oude,  beyond  the  Ganges.  When  Aurungzebe 
died,  in  1707,  his  empire  relapsed  into  anarchy.  The 
Persian  Shah  invaded  it,  and  sacked  Delhi ;  then  came  an 
invasion  of  the  Afghans.  After  them  came  the  Mahrattas, 
robbers  from  the  hills,  who  for  twenty  years  spread  terror 
throughout  Central  India,  till  they  were  put  down  by  the 
Duke  of  Wellington  in  the  early  part  of  his  career.  Up  to 
the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  the  Company's 
territories  had  been  acquired,  —  ( i )  From  the  Nabob  of 
Bengal,  a  revolted  feudatory  of  the  Great  Mogul;  (2)  By 
opposing  the  French  in  the  Carnatic  ;  (3)  By  putting  down 
the  tyrant,  Tippoo  Sahib. 

In  1846  the  English  acquired  the  Punjaub.  When  a 
petty  ruler  was  dispossessed,  he  was  pensioned  handsomely, 
as  well  as  his  family ;  or  sometimes  British  residents  were 
sent  to  the  courts  of  Native  princes  to  keep  their  affairs  in 
good  order. 

The  English  Government  was  scrupulously  careful  not  to 
interfere  with  the  idolatry  of  the  Hindoos ;  indeed,  they 
were  accused  of  patronizing  it.  "I  never  shall  forget,"  says 
an  English  officer,  "the  first  time  I  attended  Holy  Commu- 
nion in  India,  when  the  words  of  the  service  were  drowned 
in  the  roar  of  great  guns  from  the  Fort  in  honor  of  some 
idol  ceremonial." 

The  only  time  any  dispute  arose  with  the  Government 
about  caste  was  when  some  Sepoy  troops  were  ordered  to 
embark  for  Burmah,  and  they  declined  to  sail  upon  the 
sea,  because  on  board  ship  they  might  not  be  able  to  keep 
up  the  ablutions  and  other  ceremonies  required  by  their 
religion.  There  had  also  been  some  feeling  when  the 
British  Government  endeavored  to  put  down  Suttee,  and 
crushed  Thuggee.  This  last  was  a  most  strange  institution. 
The  Thugs  claimed  to  be  inspired  to  kill  any  one  whom  it 
was  put  into  their  hearts  to  kill ;  and  sixty  years  ago  Thuggee 
raged  in  Northern  India. 

The  Native  cavalry  was  more  Mohammedan  than  Hindoo ; 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  259 

the  Native  infantry  was  in  the  proportion  of  ten  Hindoos  to 
one  Mohammedan.  Each  regiment  also  contained  a  few 
Sikhs. 

At  the  opening  of  1857,  the  year  of  the  Mutiny,  the 
Native  army  in  the  Bengal  Presidency  consisted  of  eleven 
regiments  of  light  cavalry,  seventy -four  of  infantry,  five 
troops  of  artillery,  twenty-three  regiments  of  irregular  cav- 
alry, seven  battalions  of  Sikh  infantry,  and  about  twenty 
other  corps  belonging  to  Native  rulers. 

The  Company  had  also  three  brigades  of  European 
horse,  six  battalions  of  foot-artillery,  and  six  regiments  of 
European  infantry. 

The  Queen's  troops  were  two  regiments  of  cavalry,  and 
thirteen  of  foot.  The  space  guarded  by  this  force  was 
about  equal  to  France,  Austria,  and  Germany. 

Of  all  the  Native  regiments  in  Bengal,  one  only  (the 
Thirteenth)  was  found  perfectly  faithful. 

The  Sepoys  had  always  been  well  treated  by  the  English  ; 
for  one  hundred  years  they  had  done  faithful  service  ;  they 
were  supposed  to  be  greatly  attached  to  their  English 
officers.  Their  pay  was  higher  than  they  could  get  in  any 
other  employment.  Their  families  were  understood  to  be 
under  the  protection  of  the  British  Government ;  and  when 
their  terms  of  service  ended,  they  were  pensioned,  so  as  to 
be  made  comfortable  in  their  old  age. 

Up  to  1857  the  Sepoys  had  absolutely  no  grievances  to 
complain  of.  But  there  was  some  discontent  among  rich 
landowners,  and  three  dispossessed  princes,  or  princes 
under  the  tutelage  of  English  Residents,  were  ready  enough 
to  take  part  in  any  movement  which  might  open  prospects 
to  them  of  re-acquiring  their  old  liberty  of  misgovernment 
and  rapine.  These  three  princes  were,  the  representative 
of  the  Great  Mogul  at  Delhi,  the  Ex- King  of  Oude,  and 
the  ever-infamous  Nana  Sahib.  All  other  chiefs  and  princes 
of  any  consequence  in  India  remained  faithful  to  the 
English,  though  their  armies,  in  most  instances,  joined  the 
revolt. 

The  Great  Mogul  at  Delhi  was  grandson  of  a  man  rescued 


260    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

by  the  British  from  a  revolted  Vizier.  He,  however,  turned 
against  his  benefactors,  and  joined  the  Mahrattas,  was  taken 
prisoner  by  Scindia,  a  gallant  Native  chief,  and  had  his  eyes 
gouged  out  by  one  of  his  jailers  in  a  fit  of  passion.  When 
the  British  took  Delhi  from  Scindia,  this  blind  unfortunate 
was  restored  to  his  throne.  "  His  palace  at  Delhi  is  second 
only,"  says  Bishop  Heber,  "to  Windsor  Castle;"  and  his 
allowance  was  ,£120,000  a  year  (more  than  half  a  million 
of  dollars) .  He  died  at  the  age  of  eighty-six,  and  his  son 
succeeded  him. 

Delhi  is  a  very  sacred  city.  The  Great  Mogul  considered 
himself  a  very  king  of  kings ;  and  the  predecessor  of  the 
King  of  Delhi  in  1857  was  once  excessively  insulted  by  an 
English  Governor-General  of  India  taking  a  seat  in  his 
presence. 

The  English  regulation  that  all  debts  must  be  paid  was 
considered  an  unpardonable  insult  by  the  reigning  poten- 
tate. The  poor  relations  in  his  family  had  been  guaranteed 
a  living  by  the  English  Government.  The  English  yearly 
paid  money  for  them  to  the  monarch  at  Delhi,  who  kept 
it  for  himself;  and  at  last  the  dependants  complained. 
This  was  the  crowning  indignity,  which  caused  Mohammed 
Badahen  to  give  his  support  to  the  Sepoy  Mutiny. 

At  the  close  of  1856  the  Government  of  India  determined 
to  arm  its  troops  with  Enfield  rifles.  The  arms  were  sent 
out  from  England,  and  cartridges  to  fit  them.  These  car- 
tridges, unhappily,  being  wrapped  in  tougher  paper  than 
former  cartridges,  had  their  paper  greased ;  and  it  is  highly 
probable  that  lard  and  tallow  entered  into  the  composition 
used  for  that  purpose.  The  men  were  required  to  bite  off 
the  end  of  each  cartridge  before  putting  it  into  the  gun. 
The  first  mutterings  of  mutiny  were  heard  in  January, 
1857,  at  Dum-Dum,  a  station  near  Calcutta.  There  a 
man  of  low  caste,  having  asked  a  soldier  of  high  caste 
for  a  draught  of  water,  and  having  been  refused  roughly, 
shouted  in  his  anger :  "  You  will  soon  loose  your  caste  ! 
You  will  have  to  bite  cartridges  covered  with  the  fat  of 
pigs  and  cows  !  " 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  26 1 

This  speech  excited  all  the  soldiers  in  the  station ;  and 
soon  it  was  reported  and  believed  that  the  new  cartridges 
were  a  trick  of  the  British  Government  to  make  them  all 
lose  caste,  and  then  forcibly  convert  them  to  Christianity. 

The  native  non-commissioned  officers  waited  on  the 
commandant.  They  were  assured  that  the  cartridges  were 
greased  with  mutton  fat  and  wax.  They  answered  that 
this  might  be  so,  but  that  a  report  to  the  contrary  had 
spread  throughout  India,  and  that  if  they  touched  that 
grease  their  friends  would  not  believe  the  explanation,  and 
would  refuse  to  eat  with  them. 

Orders  were  then  issued  to  allow  the  Sepoys  to  get 
what  grease  they  pleased  in  the  bazaar,  and  grease  their 
own  cartridges.  This  did  not,  however,  mend  the  matter. 
The  paper  that  wrapped  the  cartridges  was  more  highly 
glazed  than  the  old-fashioned  cartridge-paper,  and  it  was 
reported  that  the  terrible  grease  had  been  employed  to 
glaze  it.  The  General  in  vain  harangued  his  brigade  on 
the  absurdity  of  supposing  that  the  Government  wished 
to  make  them  Christians  by  a  trick,  when  they  would  not 
be  admitted  to  that  religion  without  a  full  and  intelligent 
conviction  of  the  truths  contained  in  "the  Book."  His 
speech  was  without  effect.  The  spirit  of  mutiny  was  in  the 
regiment,  and  it  was  disbanded. 

At  Meerut,  a  military  station  within  a  few  hours'  march 
from  Delhi,  there  were  three  native  regiments  and  some 
European  troops  posted  for  rifle  instruction.  The  same 
difficulty  occurred  there  about  the  cartridges. 

Whether  the  men  were  called  upon  to  bite  the  cartridges, 
or  whether  they  were  only  afraid  that  they  would  be  called 
upon  to  do  so,  does  not  appear.  One  account  says  that 
not  a  single  one  of  the  objectionable  cartridges  was  ever 
issued  to  a  Native  soldier,  and  they  were,  soon  after,  all 
destroyed  in  presence  of  the  Native  regiments.  At  all 
events,  prejudice  against  pig's  fat  was  almost  as  strong 
amongst  Mohammedans  as  that  against  beef  fat  was 
amongst  Hindoos.  The  soldiers  at  Meerut  broke  into 
open  mutiny.  Eighty  were  tried,  and  condemned  to  ten 


262    ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

years'  imprisonment,  with  hard  labor.  This  sentence  was 
read  to  the  whole  force,  May  9,  1857.  The  prisoners, 
stripped  of  their  uniforms,  were  fettered,  and  marched  from 
the  parade-ground  to  the  common  jail,  which  contained 
about  two  thousand  malefactors. 

No  especial  precautions  were  taken  for  the  safety  of  the 
station.  The  next  day  was  Sunday.  The  European  troops 
had  been  to  church,  had  had  their  dinners,  and  were 
quietly  sauntering  about  their  lines.  The  officers  and  the 
ladies  were  preparing  to  go  to  evening  service.  The  chap- 
lain was  driving  there  in  his  buggy.  All  was  as  it  had  been 
every  Sunday,  in  every  station  in  India,  for  years  past,  — 
when  suddenly  there  opened  the  first  act  of  the  terrible 
tragedy  of  the  Great  Mutiny. 

The  men  of  the  Third  Light  Native  Cavalry  rushed  from 
their  tents  and  mounted  their  horses.  A  party  galloped  to 
the  jail,  overpowered  the  guard,  and  liberated  the  prisoners. 
Then,  calling  on  all  the  other  Sepoys  to  join  them,  they 
commenced  an  indiscriminate  attack  on  all  Europeans. 
Officers,  women,  and  children  were  butchered  and  muti- 
lated, and  their  houses  set  on  fire.  When  the  Sepoys  and 
the  wretches  released  from  jail  had  finished  their  work, 
they  marched  off  to  Delhi,  while  the  English  troops  in  the 
cantonments,  utterly  taken  by  surprise,  did  not  recover 
from  it  in  time  to  attack  them.  General  Anson  was  com- 
mander at  the  station,  and  seems  to  have  been  paralyzed 
by  surprise. 

Pushing  forward,  the  mutineers  reached  Delhi  the  next 
day.  The  English  there  had  received  news  of  their  com- 
ing, and  were  preparing  to  remove  their  women  and 
children.  But  it  was  too  late.  The  advanced  guard  of 
the  mutineers  rode  fearlessly  through  the  principal  gate  of 
the  city.  Every  European  that  could  be  found  was  slaugh- 
tered, and  ^500,000  of  Government  treasure  was  seized. 
The  chaplain,  Mr.  Jennings,1  and  his  young  daughter,  Miss 

1  Twenty-five  years  before,  in  large  round  childish  hand,  I  had 
signed  the  parish  register  as  witness  to  the  marriage  of  Mr.  Jen- 
nings with  Maria,  daughter  of  Admiral  Daniel. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  263 

Annie  Jennings,  were  among  the  victims.  Thank  God 
that  the  horrors  of  their  deaths  as  reported  in  the  news 
that  first  reached  England  were  exaggerated  !  But  for 
many  months  all  India,  and  all  England,  believed  them. 
In  that  wonderful  piece  of  narrative  writing,  which  is  not 
fiction  but  simple  fact,  "  Eight  Days,"  may  be  found  an 
entirely  reliable  account  of  those  events  at  Delhi.  Names 
only  are  changed.  The  author  is  the  son  of  one  of  the 
heroic  Nine  who,  with  Lieutenant  Willoughby,  blew  up  the 
arsenal,  and  themselves  with  it,  lest  the  mutineers  should 
get  possession  of  the  ammunition.  All  the  terrible  incidents 
of  the  narrative  are  true.  Mr.  Frazer,  the  British  Resident, 
was  among  the  first  slaughtered.  There  was  a  current 
belief  in  Delhi  that  the  English  dominion  in  India  could 
last  only  a  century  from  Clive's  battle  of  Plassey.  As  the 
Mutiny  spread,  all  the  Sepoys  in  that  part  of  India  marched 
from  every  point  to  Delhi.  The  old  Emperor  was  hailed 
as  representative  of  the  Great  Mogul,  and  became  the  rival 
power  to  the  English  Company.  Confidence  in  the  Com- 
pany's good  fortune  was  at  an  end. 

Soon  all  Bengal  was  in  a  flame,  with  the  imperial  city  for 
the  focus  of  the  insurrection  and  its  stronghold.  Calcutta 
was  barely  kept  down.  The  authorities  there,  refused  to 
believe  in  the  disaffection  of  the  Sepoys.  They  authorized 
the  withdrawal  of  the  objectionable  cartridges,  but  they  did 
not  disarm  the  Sepoy  regiments.  All  through  the  earlier 
stages  of  the  Mutiny  the  officers  of  the  Native  regiments 
always  insisted  that  their  own  men  were  stanch.  Many  had 
served  with  their  men  for  twenty  years,  through  toil  and 
danger,  and  believed  them  true  till  the  last  moment ;  indeed 
in  many  instances  officers  persisted  in  trusting  their  own 
Sepoys  till  the  murderous  shot  was  fired  and  they  fell  dead. 

It  was  remarked  that  the  infantry  regiments,  composed 
principally  of  Hindoo  Sepoys,  commonly  murdered  their 
officers,  while  the  cavalry  regiments,  where  the  majority 
of  the  men  were  Mohammedans,  usually  ordered  their 
officers  away,  and  forbore  otherwise  to  maltreat  them.  It 
is  also  remarkable  that  the  native  princes,  except  the  three 


264    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

already  named,  were  faithful  to  the  English ;  and,  most 
remarkable  of  all,  that  the  Punjaub,  occupied  by  the  warlike 
Sikhs,  a  province  conquered  only  nine  years  before  by  the 
English,  remained  true  to  them.  Regiments  of  Punjaubees 
and  Sikhs  were  raised  in  the  service  of  the  English,  and  the 
chiefs  of  the  Sikh  tribes  were  their  stanchest  friends.  But 
the  Company  had  Lord  Lawrence  (Sir  John  Lawrence  then) 
as  Governor  in  the  Punjaub.  He  it  was  that  saved  India  for 
the  English.  Dean  Merivale  used  to  say,  with  a  laugh,  that 
that  credit  was  due  to  himself,  notwithstanding  his  profession, 
and  although  he  had  never  been  in  India,  for  that  when  he 
and  Lawrence  were  both  youths,  the  civil  appointment 
that  Lawrence  got  had  been  offered  to  him  first,  and  he 
declined  it. 

There  were  five  Lawrences,  and  all  went  to  India.  All 
distinguished  themselves  there.  Three  were  soldiers,  viz., 
Alexander,  a  general  in  Bombay ;  Sir  Henry,  the  defender 
of  Lucknow ;  and  Sir  George  St.  Patrick,  who  was  one  of 
Akbar  Khan's  captives,  and  who,  during  the  Mutiny,  kept 
faithful  the  hill-tribes  in  Rajahpootra,  the  district  in  which 
he  was  in  command.  John  was  a  civilian,  and  bitterly  did 
he  chafe  at  not  being  a  soldier.  Their  father  had  been  an 
old  Indian  officer.  Their  mother  was  left  in  Scotland  a 
widow  with  her  large  family  of  boys.  They  all  went  to 
school  to  an  uncle  who  was  a  schoolmaster  at  London- 
derry, in  Ireland.  Henry  and  John  had  had  for  their  school- 
fellow a  boy  named  Montgomery,  who  also  went  to  India. 

When  the  Punjaub  had  been  conquered  by  the  English, 
its  government  was  placed  in  the  hands  of  three  commission- 
ers ;  these  chanced  to  be  the  three  old  schoolmates.  One 
night  as  they  were  sitting  together  they  began  to  talk  of 
old  school-days,  and  of  two  ushers,  twin  brothers,  named 
Simpson,  who  had  been  kind  to  them.  "  I  '11  tell  you  what 
we  '11  do,"  said  Henry  Lawrence.  "  The  Simpsons  must  be 
very  old  now,  and  I  dare  say  nearly  blind  :  let  us  each  send 
them  .^50  to-morrow  as  a  Christmas  gift,  with  the  good 
wishes  of  three  of  their  old  pupils,  now  .members  of  the 
Punjaub  Board  of  Administration  at  Lahore."  Months 


SIX   JOHN  LAWRENCE. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  26$ 

after  came  a  letter,  beginning,  "  My  dear,  kind  boys," 
saying  that  their  generous  gift  would  make  the  declining 
years  of  the  writer  and  his  brother  comfortable,  and  that 
it  was  precious  to  have  been  thought  of  by  pupils  who  had 
attained  what  seemed  to  be  a  high  position.  He  had  got 
out  the  old  school  atlas,  but  he  could  not  find  the  Punjaub, 
and  he  could  not  find  Lahore ;  and  neither  he  nor  his 
brother  knew  what  a  Board  of  Administration  meant,  but 
they  felt  certain  it  was  something  that  gave  their  dear  boys 
great  importance. 

Could  they  have  discovered  the  Punjaub  on  their  map, 
they  would  have  found  it  to  be  a  small  triangle,  with  its 
base  stuck  on  to  the  northwest  corner  of  the  great  triangle 
of  India.  The  Sutlej  is  its  southern  boundary,  the  Indus 
flows  through  it,  and  it  separates  Hindoostan  from  Beloo- 
chistan  and  Afghanistan. 

Over  this  great  and  difficult  possession  the  two  Lawrences 
and  Montgomery  were  appointed  to  rule.  Unhappily,  the 
views  of  the  two  brothers  did  not  agree.  Those  of  John, 
the  younger,  were  approved  by  Lord  Dalhousie,  the  Gover- 
nor-General. He  was  made  sole  head  of  the  Government  in 
the  Punjaub,  and  Henry  was  placed  over  another  province. 

There  were  sad  hearts  on  the  day  in  January,  1853,  when 
Henry  Lawrence  left  Lahore.  A  long  cavalcade  of  aged 
native  chiefs  followed  him,  some  for  five  miles,  some  for 
twenty- five,  besides  Europeans.  The  last  man  to  leave 
him  was  Robert  Napier,  afterwards  Lord  Napier  of  Mag- 
dala.  "  Kiss  him,"  said  Henry  Lawrence  to  his  sister,  as 
Napier  turned  sadly  away;  "  kiss  him,  —  he  is  my  best  and 
dearest  friend." 

The  Lawrence  brothers  still  loved  each  other,  but  their 
fraternal  relations  after  this  separation  were  never  quite  the 
same.  All  who  knew  Henry,  loved  him ;  all  who  knew 
John,  honored  him.  In  John's  later  life  his  brotherly 
resemblance  to  Henry  strengthened  with  his  years. 

Thus  John  Lawrence,  in  1857,  was  supreme  ruler  of 
the  Punjaub.  He  was  absent  from  Lahore  on  a  visit  to 
the  Hills  when  the  terrible  telegram  came  from  Delhi: 


266    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"The  Sepoys  have  come  in  from  Meerut,  and  aze  burning 
everything.  Mr.  Todd  is  dead,  and,  we  hear,  several  Euro- 
peans. We  must  shut  up.  ..."  Let  us  hope  that  this 
poor  telegraph  operator  escaped  the  fate  of  his  superior. 

From  the  first,  John  Lawrence  saw  that  the  main  point 
was  the  capture  of  Delhi.  He  believed  in  the  fidelity  of 
his  own  province,  but  was  not  willing  to  trust  the  Sepoys. 
He  disarmed  every  Sepoy  regiment  in  the  Punjaub,  but  he 
sent  down  Europeans,  Punjaubees,  and  Sikhs,  to  aid  in  the 
capture  of  Delhi. 

The  way  Sepoy  regiments  were  disarmed  was  this.  When 
a  regiment  was  found  to  be  disaffected,  if  the  governor  of 
the  province,  or  commandant  of  the  town,  was  a  man  of 
energy,  he  managed  to  assemble  the  regiment  upon  its 
parade-ground,  and  so  manoeuvred  as  to  have  European 
troops  and  loaded  cannon  fronting  them.  Then  they  were 
ordered  to  pile  their  arms,  and  in  every  instance  did  so. 
Of  course  the  disbanding  of  a  regiment  was  a  great  hard- 
ship to  any  of  the  men  who  might  be  loyal.  They  lost  all 
their  pensions  and  privileges  for  past  services.  In  some 
cases  in  the  Punjaub,  mutinous  disbanded  Sepoys  fell  into 
the  hands  of  Punjaubee  villagers,  who  hated  Hindoos,  and 
who  either  destroyed  them  themselves,  or  gave  them  up  to 
the  English  as  prisoners. 

John  Lawrence  next  proceeded  to  put  all  the  resources 
of  his  province  at  the  disposal  of  the  officers  conducting  the 
siege  of  Delhi.  He  drained  the  Punjaub  of  its  best  offi- 
cers and  its  most  trustworthy  troops ;  and  by  enlisting 
Punjaubees,  he  converted  those  who  might  have  been  dis- 
affected into  aids  to  the  English,  and  committed  them  to 
the  English  cause.  From  the  Punjaub  arsenals  siege-trains 
were  equipped  ;  from  the  Punjaub  districts  vast  numbers  of 
carts  and  carriages  were  gathered,  and  despatched  system- 
atically with  their  loads  to  Delhi ;  from  Punjaub  treasuries 
the  sinews  of  war  were  furnished. 

Men  were  raised  by  tens  of  thousands  to  replace  the 
Sepoys,  —  raised,  indeed,  in  such  numbers  that  John  Law- 
rence always  had  a  fear  upon  his  heart  that  a  new  danger 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  267 

might  arise  from  the  Punjaubees  becoming  conscious  of 
their  own  power. 

While  John  Lawrence  was  thus  ruling  in  the  Punjaub, 
his  brother,  George  St.  Patrick  Lawrence,  was  ruling  in 
Rajahpootra,  —  a  country  consisting  of  eighteen  small  Native 
states,  seventeen  of  which  were  Hindoo,  and  one  Moham- 
medan. Rajahpootra  had  been  under  the  rule  of  the  Eng- 
lish about  forty  years,  and  had  been  during  that  time 
recovering  from  the  ravages  of  the  Mahratta  freebooters. 
Everything  was  going  on  satisfactorily  and  serenely,  when, 
on  the  i  gth  of  May,  arrived  news  of  the  outbreak  at  Meerut 
and  the  massacre  at  Delhi.  At  once  Sir  George  Lawrence 
saw  that  the  whole  Native  army  was  contaminated.  He 
ruled  over  about  ten  millions  of  men,  had  about  five  thou- 
sand Sepoys  in  his  province,  and  seventy  European  soldiers, 
with  twenty-five  to  thirty  British  officers  and  officials. 

There  was  a  great  arsenal  in  Rajahpootra.  The  troops 
that  had  it  in  charge  were  Sepoys  of  high  caste.  There 
was  also  a  regiment  in  the  province  composed  of  low-caste 
men.  These  had  no  sympathy  with  the  high-caste  Sepoys, 
and  were  believed,  justly,  to  be  true  to  British  rule.  By 
forced  marches  they  were  moved  suddenly  upon  the  arsenal, 
and  put  into  possession  of  the  place.  Had  it  fallen  into  the 
hands  of  the  mutineers,  with  all  the  ammunition  it  con- 
tained, Rajahpootra  would  have  been  lost. 

All  over  the  country  the  Sepoys  always  protested  their 
fidelity  to  the  last  moment,  and  very  often  gave  striking 
proofs  of  it  till  the  moment  came  for  their  outbreak.  That 
outbreak  was  generally  preceded  by  a  fire  in  the  canton- 
ments or  the  officers'  bungalows.  Then,  in  the  confusion, 
came  the  mutiny,  with  more  or  less  murdering  of  Europeans, 
and  then  the  revolted  troops  marched  for  Delhi  or  Agra. 
Some  regiments  in  Rajahpootra  revolted  ;  but  the  Native 
chiefs,  from  various  motives,  remained  true,  though  it  was 
beyond  their  power  to  control  their  Native  soldiers.  George 
Lawrence  had  acted  very  differently  from  those  who  deemed 
it  the  best  policy  to  keep  up  a  show  of  confidence  in  the 
Sepoys  till  they  broke  into  revolt.  His  policy  saved  British 


268    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

interests,  without  imperilling  a  single  life ;  the  other  policy 
saved  British  interests,  but  shed  a  sea  of  blood. 

We  all  know  how  the  Ganges  flows  into  the  Bay  of  Ben- 
gal below  Calcutta,  and  that  below  Calcutta  its  principal 
branch  is  called  the  Hoogly.  On  the  eastern,  or  left,  bank  of 
the  Ganges  lies  the  kingdom  of  Oude.  About  a  thousand 
miles  up  the  Ganges,  on  the  right  bank  of  the  river  (the 
shore  of  Oude  being  on  the  left  bank) ,  is  the  English  mili- 
tary station  of  Cawnpore,  —  familiar  in  my  young  days  to 
all  those  who  read  the  works  of  Mrs.  Sherwood,  or  the 
Memoirs  of  Henry  Martyn.  This  place  at  the  time  of  the 
Mutiny  had  an  unusually  small  European  garrison ;  but  it 
was  full  of  Europeans,  many  of  them  young  English  civil 
engineers,  and  there  were  also  many  women  and  children. 
The  general  in  command  was  Sir  Hugh  Wheeler. 

Before,  however,  telling  the  disastrous  history  of  Cawn- 
pore, or  that  of  the  kingdom  of  Oude,  let  me  give  a  speci- 
men story  of  what,  during  those  months  of  May,  June,  and 
July,  1 85  7,  was  taking  place  all  over  Bengal.  I  chose  this 
particular  narrative  because  on  it,  I  think,  was  founded 
that  admirable  Mutiny  story  which,  twenty  years  after  the 
Mutiny,  appeared  in  "  Blackwood,"  called  the  "  Dilemma."  1 

The  incidents  I  am  to  tell  took  place  in  the  little  walled 
town  of  Arah,  upon  which  a  force  of  mutinous  Sepoys  from 
Dinapore  marched,  on  July  26,  1857,  to  massacre  the  resi- 
dents and  plunder  the  treasure.  The  plundering  of  the 
treasury  and  the  opening  of  the  jail  came  always  first  in 
each  outbreak  of  the  Mutiny. 

Having  reached  Arah,  broken  open  the  treasury,  and 
released  all  prisoners,  the  mutineers  proceeded  to  slaughter 
the  Europeans.  But  here  they  were  foiled.  All  the  Euro- 
pean men  in  the  place  were  civilians.  They  shut  themselves 
up  in  one  of  two  houses  in  a  compound,  which  they  fortified 
so  as  to  resist  any  sudden  assault.  Mr.  Boyle,  the  chief 
man  in  the  place,  had  for  some  weeks  been  laying  in  stores. 
Ammunition  was  collected,  loopholes  were  pierced  in  the 
walls,  and  sandbags  were  placed  on  the  roof.  There  were 

1  A  total  misnomer,  because  in  it  there  is  no  dilemma  at  all. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  269 

fifteen  Europeans  and  half-castes  (or  Eurasians)  in  Arab, 
a  Mohammedan  gentleman  who  joined  his  fate  to  theirs, 
and  fifty  Sikh  soldiers.  The  united  garrison  was  thus 
sixty-six  souls. 

The  Sepoys  were  greatly  amazed  when  they  found  them- 
selves checked  by  the  defenders  of  one  small  house.  They 
attacked  it,  and  were  entirely  discomfited.  Then  they 
tried  to  corrupt  the  Sikhs,  but  the  Sikhs  stood  firm.  Next 
they  brought  up  cannon,  and  their  grapeshot  riddled  the 
walls  of  the  house,  but  did  not  lessen  the  courage  of  the 
garrison. 

Three  days  the  cannonade  continued.  On  the  third  day 
a  force  was  sent  from  Dinapore  for  their  relief;  but,  alas  ! 
it  was  intercepted  and  defeated.  Only  one  man  of  the 
relief  party  reached  the  beleaguered  garrison,  and  brought 
the  terrible  news. 

In  Dinapore,  when  the  repulse  of  the  relieving  force  was 
known,  the  little  garrison  were  given  up  for  lost.  But  the 
garrison  themselves  did  not  utterly  despair.  They  knew 
that  detachments  of  English  troops  were  being  sent  up  the 
country.  They  hoped  that  one  would  pause  upon  its  march, 
and  come  and  help  them.  Nor  were  they  deceived.  Major 
Vincent  Eyre  (who  wrote  for  us  a  narrative  of  the  Cabul 
massacre)  arrived  off  Dinapore  with  a  body  of  troops,  on 
his  way  to  the  siege  of  Delhi,  from  Calcutta.  He  met  the 
broken  and  defeated  troops  who  had  failed  to  relieve  Arah. 
He  at  once  proposed  to  disregard  his  orders,  and  go  to  the 
help  of  the  brave  garrison.  Just  as  they  were  in  the  last 
extremity,  he  drove  off  the  Sepoys  and  delivered  them. 
Then  he  marched  on  and  destroyed  the  stronghold  of  the 
native  chief  who  had  assisted  and  encouraged  the  besiegers. 
The  "  leaguer  of  Arah  "  was  one  of  the  brilliant  episodes  in 
this  terrible  war,  and  was  conducted  entirely  by  civilians. 

Major  Eyre  continued  on  his  way  to  Delhi  as  soon  as  his 
work  was  done. 

After  Delhi,  the  most  important  city  in  the  Bengal  Presi- 
dency is  Agra,  the  headquarters  of  the  government  of  the 
Northwest  Provinces,  a  division  of  India  containing  about 


270    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

thirty  million  of  inhabitants.  At  Agra  lived  not  only  the 
Lieutenant-Governor,  Mr.  Colvin,  and  his  staff  of  subordi- 
nates, but  the  city  contained  many  missionary  establish- 
ments, —  a  Roman  Catholic  bishop,  a  convent  of  nuns, 
several  Presbyterian  missionaries,  and  a  Government  college 
largely  devoted  to  the  education  of  half-castes,  or  Eurasians. 
One  clergyman  in  Agra  at  the  time  of  the  Mutiny  was  Mr. 
Fullarton,  with  his  American  wife,  who,  notwithstanding  her 
three  children  and  the  smallness  of  her  husband's  salary, 
found  time  to  devote  much  attention  to  missionary  work, 
especially  endeavoring  to  train  half-caste  girls  to  be  good 
Christian  wives  and  mothers,  such  as  the  heathen  around 
them  might  take  a  lesson  from. 

"  Like  a  thunderclap,"  says  Mr.  Farquahar,  one  of  the  Com- 
pany's officers,  "  the  news  of  the  mutiny  at  Meerut  on  the  loth 
of  May  fell  on  the  Agra  community,  and  turned  the  whole  cur- 
rent of  men's  thoughts  to  preparations  for  the  coming  struggle. 
At  that  time  three  Native  and  one  English  regiment  were  at 
Agra,  with  a  battery  of  six  guns  manned  by  Europeans.  The 
English  force,  indeed,  was  about  six  hundred  in  all.  On  Satur- 
day night,  May  30,  news  arrived  that  some  companies  of  one 
of  the  Agra  regiments  had  mutinied  at  a  station  thirty-five  miles 
off,  and  had  fired  on  their  English  officers.  The  Agra  regi- 
ments, notwithstanding  their  protestations  of  fidelity  to  their 
salt,  could  no  longer  be  trusted.  The  authorities  resolved  to 
disarm  them  the  next  day,  and  send  the  men  to  their  homes. 
The  next  step  was  to  gather  together  all  the  Christians,  Euro- 
pean and  Eurasian,  in  places  appointed  beforehand  as  a  refuge 
in  case  of  danger. 

"  The  Sabbath  sun  rose  that  morning  on  a  strange  scene  in 
the  usually  well-ordered  station  of  Agra.  Instead  of  early  morn- 
ing church,  the  troops,  Native  and  English,  were  assembled  on 
parade,  and  then  the  Natives,  to  their  great  astonishment,  found 
themselves  drawn  up  opposite  the  European  regiment  and  guns, 
and  were  ordered  to  lay  down  their  arms.  The  great  mass  of 
men  obeyed,  as  they  had  no  time  to  make  any  arrangements, 
and,  piling  their  arms,  saw  them  carted  away  to  the  magazine. 
Mr.  Fullarton,  with  his  wife  and  family,  was  ordered  to  a  dilapi- 
dated bungalow,  pitched  on  the  top  of  an  old  limekiln,  which, 
from  age,  was  covered  with  sheltering  trees  and  grass.  About 
ten  in  the  evening  I  visited  them,  and  there,  outside  the  house. 


THE  INDIAff  MUTINY.  2/1 

lay  groups  of  gentlemen  under  the  trees,  talking  quietly  over  the 
events  of  the  day,  but  with  loaded  double-barrelled  guns,  and 
plenty  of  ammunition  at  their  sides.  In  the  verandas  ladies  and 
native  ayahs  lay  pretty  closely  packed,  while  the  floors  of  the 
rooms  inside  were  strewed  with  about  as  many  babies  and  young 
children  as  they  could  readily  hold.  I  saw  Mr.  Fullarton  and 
some  other  gentlemen  sitting  below  under  one  of  the  trees.  The 
full  moon  shone  through  the  leaves,  and  I  remember  well  Mr. 
Fullarton's  face  turned  up  to  speak  to  me,  with  a  look  and  word 
of  thankfulness  for  the  mercies  of  the  day.  At  his  side,  too,  lay 
a  double-barrelled  gun  which  some  gentleman  had  given  him, 
knowing  well  that  he  would  use  it  in  defence  of  women  and 
children." 

Five  weeks  later  the  devoted  Lieutenant-Governor  Col- 
vin  was  dead.  The  six  hundred  European  soldiers  had 
been  marched  out  of  Agra  to  meet  five  thousand  mutineers, 
and,  by  mismanagement  on  the  part  of  their  commander, 
had  been  forced  to  retreat  back  into  the  Fort  without  cutting 
the  rebels  to  pieces,  though  they  scared  them  off  to  Delhi. 
Then  all  the  Christian  population  of  Agra  was  ordered  into 
the  Fort,  for  the  lower  and  dangerous  classes  in  the  city 
were  setting  fire  to  their  bungalows,  and  burned  and 
destroyed  everything.  But  the  lives  of  the  civilians  and 
native  Christians  (with  a  few  painful  exceptions)  were 
saved. 

"  In  this  respect,"  says  Mr.  Farquahar,  "  we  were  immeasura- 
bly better  off  than  the  people  of  Cawnpore,  Futtehghur,  Delhi, 
and  other  stations.  Distressing  news  from  these  places  har- 
rowed the  hearts  of  the  Agra  people,  whose  friends  and  rela- 
tions were  the  sufferers.  But  Mr.  Fullarton  and  the  other 
American  missionaries  were  most  moved  by  the  news  from 
Futtehghur,  where  there  was  a  flourishing  colony  of  indus- 
trious native  Christians  under  charge  of  American  Presbyterian 
Missionaries. 

"  The  English  at  Futtehghur  took  refuge  in  the  Fort.  There, 
as  death  from  starvation  threatened  them,  it  was  resolved  to 
embark  upon  the  Ganges  in  some  boats  stealthily  with  their 
women  and  children,  and  drop  down  the  river  to  Cawnpore- 
They  were  fired  on  from  the  banks  when  they  nearly  reached 
that  place,  and  every  one  was  slaughtered.  Then  the  Sepoys 


2/2    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

and  the  mob  at  Futtehghur  set  on  the  Christian  village,  wrecked 
it,  and  slew  every  Christian  they  could  lay  their  hands  on. 
News  came  to  Agra  that  all  had  perished;  but  other  news  came 
that  some  few  had  escaped,  and  were  wandering  in  the  jungle. 
Again  news  came  that  one  and  then  another  had  been  caught, 
tortured,  slain  with  the  sword,  or  blown  away  from  guns." 

Great  was  the  rapture  with  which  the  remnant  of  these 
Christians  received  Mr.  Fullarton  when,  as  soon  as  it  was 
practicable,  he  crossed  the  country  in  disguise,  made  his 
way  into  Havelock's  camp,  and  thence  to  his  people. 

"  Some  had  been  wandering  for  months  in  the  jungle,  more  or 
less  hunted  and  harassed.  Part  had  been  hidden  and  cared 
for  by  a  native  village  chief  at  his  great  personal  risk.  He  had 
had  compassion  on  them,  and  a  heart  to  hate  the  cruelty  of  the 
city  roughs  and  mutinous  Sepoys.  '  These  native  Christians,' 
adds  the  gentleman  who  tells  their  story,  '  had  borne  the  spoil- 
ing of  their  goods  ;  they  had  seen  some  of  their  number  cruelly 
murdered;  they  had  suffered  the  humiliations  and  had  under- 
gone the  hardships,  the  anxieties,  the  fears  that  fill  up  the  cup 
of  bitterness  that  martyrs  in  other  climes  and  other  ages  have 
had  to  drain.  They  had  only  to  renounce  their  faith,  in  order 
that  they  and  their  families  might  be  restored  to  honor  and  com- 
fort. But  they  would  not  deny  their  Saviour,  and  suffered, — 
a  noble  company  of  witnesses  for  the  truth.' " 

Alas  !  that  I  must  end  this  story  by  telling  that,  in  little 
more  than  a  year  after,  Mr.  Fullarton  died  of  cancer  in 
the  tongue,  and  his  widow,  with  her  children,  returned 
to  America. 

When  we  think  how  the  Mutiny  was  spread  out  over  a 
country  as  large  as  Central  Europe,  it  seems  impossible  to 
avoid  telling  its  story  by  disconnected  episodes,  instead  of 
a  continuous  tale. 

About  thirty-seven  years  ago  there  came  out  a  book 
which  attracted  great  attention  at  the  time,  though  at 
present  it  seems  little  known.  It  was  called,  I  think,  "  The 
Private  Life  of  an  Eastern  King,"  and  gave  an  account  of 
the  young  tyrant  of  Oude,  —  his  habits,  his  courtiers,  his 
elephants,  his  wild- beast  hunts,  his  low  debaucheries,  his 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  273 

cruelties,  and  all  the  rest.  It  was  written  apparently  by 
some  man  about  his  court  who  was  a  European.  He,  like 
Louis  XI.,  made  his  barber  his  favorite  minister.  One  felt 
as  if  such  a  creature  ought  not  to  be  allowed  to  live  outside 
of  an  insane  asylum,  much  less  be  suffered  to  reign.  So 
in  time  thought  the  British  Government,  which  annexed 
Oude,  gave  the  King  a  magnificent  pension,  and  deprived 
him  of  his  power. 

Having  annexed  Oude,  the  English  proceeded  to  intro- 
duce their  new  land  system,  calculated  to  depress  the  old 
aristocracy  and  reduce  it  to  poverty.  The  land  then  fell 
into  the  hands  of  men  of  much  lower  degree,  and,  be  it 
said,  with  far  less  sense  of  honor.  The  system  —  which 
hardly  need  be  explained  in  this  brief  sketch  —  was  harshly 
carried  out;  and  the  result  was  that  by  the  beginning  of 
1857  affairs  in  Oude  were  working  so  ill  that  the  mild  and 
conciliating  Henry  Lawrence  was  sent  as  governor  into  the 
province,  to  see  what  he  could  do  with  so  dissatisfied  a 
people. 

The  court  of  Oude  had  been  Mohammedan,  but  the 
people  were  nearly  all  Hindoos.  Oude  was  only  separated 
by  the  Ganges  from  the  rest  of  British  India.  It  had  not 
only  been  always  on  good  terms  with  the  English,  but  had 
been  the  Sepoys'  recruiting-ground.  The  general  dissatis- 
faction, therefore,  with  the  newfangled  regulations  of  the 
new  Government  reacted  on  the  Sepoys  in  the  Company's 
army. 

Lucknow  is  the  capital  of  Oude.  Here  is  Sir  Henry 
Lawrence's  description  of  the  city :  — 

"The  part  called  the  modern  city  is  both  curious  and  splen- 
did, and  altogether  unlike  the  other  great  towns  of  India, 
whether  Hindoo  or  Mohammedan.  There  is  a  strange  dash 
of  European  architecture  among  its  Oriental  buildings.  Trav- 
ellers have  compared  the  place  to  Moscow  and  Constantinople, 
and  we  can  easily  fancy  the  resemblance.  Gilded  domes  sur- 
mounted by  the  crescent ;  tall  slender  pillars ;  lofty  colonnades  ; 
houses  that  look  as  if  they  had  been  transplanted  from  Regent 
Street ;  iron  railings  and  balconies ;  cages,  some  containing 

18 


2/4    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

wild  beasts,  and  others  filled  with  strange  bright  birds  ;  gardens  ; 
fountains  and  cypress-trees,  elephants,  camels,  and  horses ; 
gilt  letters  and  English  barouches,  —  all  these  form  a  charming 
picture." 

It  was  in  March,  1857,  when  the  Mutiny  was  just  ripen- 
ing, and  chappatties  (those  mysterious  cakes  which  are  the 
signal  for  a  rising)  were  being  distributed  all  over  the  coun- 
try, that  Sir  Henry  Lawrence  was  made  Governor  of  Oude, 
and  went  to  Lucknow. 

Sir  Henry's  first  endeavor  was  to  conciliate  the  old 
Mohammedan  aristocracy ;  and  in  this  he  succeeded  re- 
markably in  six  weeks,  but  he  was  not  slow  to  detect  the 
rising  feeling  of  mistrust  in  all  parts  of  his  province.  He 
saw  that  the  feelings  of  the  people  were  deeply  excited 
on  the  caste  question,  and  he  knew  any  agitation  on  that 
subject  to  be  dangerous.  He  saw  that  it  was  everywhere 
believed  that  the  British  Government  was  bent  on  destroy- 
ing the  caste  of  Hindoo  Sepoys,  and  he  knew  that  to  main- 
tain that  caste  inviolate  the  Hindoo  would  risk  his  life,  his 
property,  his  household,  all  he  most  valued  in  the  world. 
He  wrote  to  Lord  Canning,  the  Governor-General :  — 

"  I  held  a  conversation  with  a  Jemadar  of  the  Oude  artillery 
for  more  than  an  hour  to-day,  and  was  startled  by  the  dogged 
persistence  of  the  man  (a  Brahmin,  of  about  forty  years  of  age, 
of  excellent  character)  in  the  belief  that  for  ten  years  past  Gov- 
ernment had  been  engaged  in  measures  for  the  forcible,  or 
rather  the  fraudulent,  conversion  of  the  natives." 

Very  shortly  indeed  after  Sir  Henry's  arrival  at  Lucknow, 
a  great  deal  of  excited  feeling  was  manifested  because 
a  surgeon  of  the  Sixty-eighth  Native  Regiment  had  in- 
cautiously put  to  his  mouth  a  bottle  of  medicine.  The 
Sepoys  attributed  his  doing  so  to  a  deep-laid  design  to 
destroy  their  caste ;  and  although  he  at  once  broke  the 
bottle  in  their  presence,  they  burned  his  house  down. 

But  while  Sir  Henry  used  all  means  of  persuasion  with 
the  Sepoys,  and  conciliation  with  the  nobles,  he  did  not 
neglect  precautions.  He  determined  to  fortify  the  English 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  2?$ 

Residency  in  Lucknow  as  a  place  of  refuge  in  case  of  need, 
arid  to  store  it  abundantly  with  ammunition  and  provisions. 

When  news  of  the  mutiny  at  Meerut  was  telegraphed 
to  him,  he  urged  the  Governor- General  to  lose  no  time  in 
sending  to  China,  Ceylon,  and  other  places  for  European 
troops,  and  asked  leave,  which  was  granted  him,  to  apply 
to  the  gallant  ruler  of  Nepaul,  in  the  Hills,  a  Mohamme- 
dan prince,  who,  when  on  a  visit  to  London  about  ten  years 
before,  had  made  a  great  sensation. 

Lucknow  lies  along  the  banks  of  the  river  Gumtee,  and 
is  about  fifty  miles  from  Cawnpore.  On  the  3oth  of  May, 
the  mutiny  broke  out  among  the  Native  troops  stationed 
around  Lucknow,  and  soon  Sir  Henry  Lawrence  and  the 
Europeans  were  shut  up  in  the  Residency,  surrounded  by  a 
howling  savage  multitude,  raging  like  the  sea,  but  fearfully 
dangerous,  because  largely  composed  of  disciplined  soldiers. 
Everywhere  it  was  the  same  story.  The  European  officers 
of  native  troops  believing  in  their  men  to  the  last  moment ; 
the  men  turning  upon  them  suddenly,  and  killing  them. 
In  some  instances  they  were  merely  ordered  off,  and  suf- 
fered to  gallop  back  to  Lucknow.  Sometimes  for  a  while, 
in  particular  instances,  the  Sepoys  showed  extraordinary 
fidelity  ;  but  their  loyalty  rarely  stood  the  contact  with  other 
regiments  that  were  in  full  revolt. 

Here  is  the  story  of  poor  Mr.  Christian  and  his  family, 
picked  out  among  a  multitude  of  others,  all  very  nearly  the 
same. 

Mr.  Christian  was  the  English  Resident,  at  a  station  not 
far  from  the  Hills,  called  Sitapore.  On  June  2,  two  native 
regiments,  having  insisted  that  the  flour  served  out  to  them 
was  adulterated  with  something  to  destroy  their  caste,  the 
flour  was  all  destroyed  to  satisfy  them.  The  next  day 
these  regiments  went  out  and  opposed  a  large  body  of 
mutinous  Sepoys.  The  day  after,  they  shot  their  officers 
and  rode  off  to  Lucknow. 

"  It  is  not  easy,"  says  the  account  I  am  following,  "to  describe 
the  scene  that  followed.  Other  mutineers  rushed  with  yells 
against  Mr.  Christian's  bungalow.  The  only  possible  safety 


2/6    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

was  in  flight,  and  flight  was  difficult.  A  little  river  ran  behind 
the  bungalow.  The  fugitives  had  to  cross  it.  Mr.  Christian, 
who  had  boldly  started,  rifle  in  hand,  to  stay  the  mutineers,  see- 
ing that  all  was  lost,  returned  to  flee  with  his  family.  Preceded 
by  his  wife,  with  her  infant  in  her  arms,  he  succeeded  in  cross- 
ing the  little  river;  but  he  had  scarcely  reached  the  opposite 
shore  when  he  was  shot  dead  by  the  pursuers.  A  similar  fate 
befell  his  wife,  her  baby,  and  the  nurse.  The  elder  child,  a 
girl,  who  had  been  taken  across  the  river  by  a  sergeant,  was 
conveyed  by  him  to  the  estate  of  the  Rajah  of  Mithoti,  and 
ultimately  to  Lucknow,  where  she  died.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Thorn- 
hill,  also  residents  at  Sitapore,  were  shot  crossing  the  stream. 
A  few  gentlemen  and  one  lady  escaped,  and  reached  the  lands 
of  the  Mithoti  Rajah.  He  felt  that  it  was  very  dangerous  to 
protect  them,  and  all  he  dared  to  do  for  them  was  to  promise 
to  put  food  where  they  could  get  it  if  they  hid  in  the  jungle. 
There  they  stayed  nearly  five  months,  when  a  party  of  Sepoys 
captured  them,  and  took  them  prisoners  into  their  camp  before 
Lucknow." 

A  party,  consisting  of  nine  ladies,  ten  children,  and  three 
men,  reached  Lucknow,  in  a  month,  by  circuitous  paths, 
concealing  themselves  in  the  day-time,  and  protected  by  a 
native  nobleman. 

Multiply  such  stories  by  fifty,  and  they  will  give  some 
idea  of  what  was  going  on  all  over  India  in  the  summer 
of  1857.  Sometimes  fugitives  were  all  murdered,  as  was 
the  case  with  a  party  from  Mohamider,  who  trusted  to  a 
Sepoy  guard  who  swore  to  escort  them  in  safety.  The  sole 
survivor  of  this  party  tells  the  story  :  — 

"  We  were  on  our  way  to  Arangabad,  when  suddenly  a  halt 
was  sounded,  and  a  trooper  told  us  to  go  on  our  way  where  we 
liked.  There  were  three  ladies  with  us,  crammed  into  one 
buggy ;  the  remainder  lay  prone  on  baggage-carts.  We  went  on 
for  some  distance,  when  we  saw  a  party  coming  along.  They 
soon  joined  us  and  followed  the  buggy,  which  we  were  pushing 
along  with  all  our  might.  When  we  were  half  a  mile  from 
Arangabad,  a  Sepoy  sprang  forward,  snatched  Ray's  gun  from 
him,  and  shot  down  poor  old  Shiels,  who  was  riding  my  horse. 
Then  the  most  infernal  struggle  ever  witnessed  by  men  began. 
We  all  collected  under  a  tree  close  by,  and  put  the  ladies  down 
from  the  buggy.  Shots  were  firing  in  all  directions,  amid  the 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  277 

most  fearful  yells.  The  poor  ladies  all  joined  in  prayer,  coolly 
and  unflinchingly  awaiting  their  fate.  I  stopped  for  about  three 
minutes  amongst  them,  but,  thinking  of  my  poor  wife  and  child, 
I  endeavored  to  save  my  life  for  their  sakes.  I  rushed  out 
towards  the  insurgents,  and  one  of  our  native  soldiers  called  out 
to  me  to  throw  down  my  pistol  and  he  would  save  me.  I  did 
so,  when  he  put  himself  between  me  and  the  assailants,  and 
several  others  followed  his  example.  In  about  ten  minutes  they 
had  completed  their  hellish  work.  They  killed  the  wounded 
and  the  children,  butchering  them  in  the  most  cruel  way.  They 
denuded  the  bodies  of  their  clothes  for  the  sake  of  plunder. 
All  were  killed  but  myself;  viz.,  one  civilian,  three  captains, 
six  lieutenants,  three  ensigns,  one  sergeant,  a  band-master, 
eight  ladies,  and  four  children." 

I  need  not  repeat  more  of  these  sickening  stories;  it 
is  pleasanter  to  relate  that  kindness  was  shown  to  escaping 
bands  of  fugitives  by  village  landowners,  grateful  to  Sir 
Henry  Lawrence,  and  by  small  Rajahs.  Some  Hill  chiefs 
fell  into  disfavor  with  their  own  clans  for  hesitation  to  help 
the  fugitives.  One  chiefs  wife  left  him  for  his  inhumanity ; 
and  another  native  lady,  wife  of  an  old  Rajah,  bound  her 
husband  by  an  oath  to  show  English  fugitives  any  comfort 
and  protection  in  his  power.  Some  of  those  who  showed 
most  kindness  to  the  English,  in  their  hour  of  distress  and 
humiliation,  were  men  of  wealth  who  had  suffered  much 
from  the  rough  carrying  out  of  Lord  Dalhousie's  land 
policy. 

Sir  Henry  Lawrence,  in  Lucknow,  managed  to  keep  open 
communication,  by  means  of  spies  and  secret  messengers, 
with  other  stations,  whence  telegraphic  messages  and  letters 
were  sent  to  other  places.  But,  next  to  the  safety  of  the 
people  with  him,  what  weighed  upon  his  heart  was  the 
condition  of  Cawnpore.  In  this  place,  Sir  Hugh  Wheeler 
was  shut  up  with  many  women  and  children.  It  was  but 
fifty  miles  from  Lucknow,  but  it  was  on  the  other  side 
of  the  Ganges.  Most  piteously  did  Sir  Hugh  implore  Sir 
Henry  to  send  him  help.  But  this  was  impossible.  There 
were  no  means  by  which  to  cross  the  river,  even  if  the  little 
force  from  Lucknow  could  have  got  so  far. 


2/8    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Cawnpore  was  invested  by  Nana  Sahib.  This  was  not 
the  man's  name,  but  his  title.  He  was  a  Mahratta  chief, 
claiming  to  be  the  adopted  son  of  the  last  sovereign  of  the 
Mahrattas.  When  that  personage  had  yielded  his  domin- 
ions to  the  English,  he  had  been  granted  a  pension  for  him- 
self and  for  his  heirs.  He  died  without  issue,  but  had 
adopted  a  short  time  before  his  death  Dundoo  Punt,  or 
Nana  Sahib.  Lord  Dalhousie  asserted  that  the  Nana  had 
no  claim  to  the  reversion  of  the  pension.  The  Nana  natu- 
rally thought  he  had.  Yet,  with  inconsistency  ori  the  part 
of  the  English  Government,  he  was  allowed  to  retain  his 
adopted  father's  title  of  Peishwar,  and  to  surround  himself 
with  troops  and  guns.  It  is  a  little  remarkable  that  the 
Sepoys  in  this  rebellion  had  no  general  who  showed  any 
generalship,  or  seems  to  have  commanded  their  confidence 
or  their  attachment.  Their  nearest  approach  to  such  a 
leader  was  the  Nana,  who  joined  them  before  Cawnpore. 

Here  is  Sir  Hugh  Wheeler's  piteous  last  letter  to  Sir 
Henry  Lawrence,  dated  June  24,  1857  :  — 

"  Since  the  last  details,  we  have  had  a  bombardment  in  this 
miserable  position  three  or  four  times  daily;  now  nineteen 
days  exposed  to  two  twenty-fours,  and  eight  other  guns  of 
smaller  calibre,  and  three  mortars.  To  reply  with  three  nines 
is,  you  know,  out  of  the  question  ;  neither  would  our  ammuni- 
tion permit  it.  All  our  gun-carriages  are  more  or  less  disabled; 
ammunition  short.  British  spirit  alone  remains  ;  but  it  cannot 
last  forever.  Yesterday  morning  they  attempted  their  most 
formidable  assault,  but  dared  not  come  on.  And  after  above 
three  hours  in  the  trenches,  cheering  on  the  men,  I  returned  to 
the  Fort  to  find  my  favorite  darling  son  killed  by  a  nine-pounder 
in  the  room  with  his  mother  and  sisters.  He  was  not  able  to 
accompany  me,  having  been  fearfully  crippled  by  a  severe  con- 
tusion. The  cannonade  was  tremendous.  I  venture  to  assert 
such  a  position,  so  defended,  has  no  example ;  but  cruel  has 
been  the  evil.  We  have  no  instruments,  no  medicine  ;  pro- 
visions for  ten  days  at  furthest,  and  no  possibility  of  getting 
any,  as  communication  with  the  town  is  cut  off.  Railway  men 
and  merchants  have  swollen  our  ranks  to  what  they  are  (we  had 
but  two  hundred  and  twenty  soldiers  to  begin  with),  and  the 
casualties  have  been  numerous.  The  railroad  men  have  done 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  279 

excellent  service,  but  neither  they  nor  I  can  last  forever. 
We  have  lost  everything  belonging  to  us,  and  have  not 
even  a  change  of  linen.  Surely  we  are  not  to  die  like  rats 
in  a  cage." 

.  Sir  Henry  replied,  urging  his  friend  to  hold  out ;  assuring 
him  that  Europeans  and  Sikhs  were  coming  to  his  relief 
from  Allahabad ;  and  adding,  "  Do  not  accept  terms  from 
the  enemy,  as  I  much  fear  treachery.  You  cannot  rely  on 
the  Nana's  promises."  And  then  he  adds  in  French,  "  He 
has  killed  many  prisoners." 

When  this  letter  was  written,  poor  Wheeler  had  already 
accepted  terms.  He  had  been  wounded,  and  was  dying. 
The  moment  the  garrison  was  in  the  hands  of  the  Nana,  he 
followed  up  his  murder  of  the  Futtehghur  fugitives  (a  few 
weeks  before)  by  slaughtering  every  man  of  the  garrison, 
and  many  of  the  women  and  children.  The  remainder 
before  long  met  the  same  fate.  Of  this  subsequent  butch- 
ery I  will  tell  hereafter,  when  I  relate  Havelock's  march 
into  Cawnpore, 

Meantime,  the  Presidencies  of  Madras  and  Bombay  were 
in  comparative  tranquillity.  The  latter  was  under  a  very 
able  governor,  Lord  Elphinstone.  That  the  Punjaub  was 
kept  faithful,  and  more  than  faithful,  —  serviceable,  —  was 
due  to  Sir  John  Lawrence ;  while  the  country  of  the  Raja- 
poots  was  kept  steady  by  his  brother.  Cawnpore  and  Delhi 
were  in  the  hands  of  the  rebels,  and  the  great  object  of  the 
English  was  to  recover  Delhi  and  put  down  the  newly  pro- 
claimed Emperor,  who  had  his  throne  there.  In  Oude  the 
only  spot  possessed  by  the  English  was  the  Residency  at 
Lucknow,  which  sheltered  about  four  thousand  souls.  It 
was  surrounded,  however,  by  an  immense  army  of  rebels, 
raging  like  an  angry  sea. 

Sir  Henry  Lawrence  had  been  upon  the  point  of  going 
home  on  sick  leave  when  he  was  earnestly  entreated  by  Lord 
Canning  to  undertake  the  pacification  of  Oude.  He  had  not 
been  there  six  weeks  when  the  Mutiny  broke  out.  It  was 
now  nearly  July.  Once  or  twice  he  had  been  so  far  incapaci- 
tated by  illness  that  he  had  temporarily  resigned  his  authority 


28O    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

into  the  hands  of  a  council.  The  leading  man  in  this  coun- 
cil was  a  Mr.  Gubbins,  whom  Sir  Henry  deemed  too  rash ; 
but,  indirectly  influenced  by  this  gentleman  and  those  who 
thought  like  him,  he,  on  June  30,  made  a  sortie  with  his 
little  force  of  about  six  hundred  English,  opposed,  probably, 
to  six  thousand  rebels.  The  sortie  resulted  in  nothing  but 
a  loss  of  valuable  English  lives,  which  Sir  Henry  felt  very 
keenly.  Afterwards  the  mutineers  poured  into  the  city  of 
Lucknow,  and  the  British  and  their  supporters  (among  them 
one  stanch  regiment  of  Sepoys)  were  shut  up  in  the  Resi- 
dency. There  Sir  Henry  "  had  to  keep  up  the  appearance 
of  sanguine  confidence,  when  his  whole  soul  was  engrossed 
with  thoughts  of  the  dreadful  fate  awaiting  the  helpless  crea- 
tures —  women  and  children  —  committed  to  his  charge. 
He  had  to  soothe,  argue  with,  and  command  the  miscella- 
neous tempers  which  surrounded  him,  some  hampering  him 
with  their  fears  and  their  advice,  some  always  urging  him  on 
to  what  they  considered  to  be  more  decisive  measures." 

He  had  selected  as  his  own  quarters  in  the  Residency  a 
room  in  the  upper  story,  because  it  gave  him  a  good  range 
of  observation.  During  the  first  day's  attack,  July  i,  a  shell 
burst  in  that  room  between  Sir  Henry  and  a  friend  who  was 
sitting  near  him.  He  was  urged  to  change  his  chamber,  but 
laughingly  replied  that  he  did  not  believe  the  enemy  had  a 
gunner  good  enough  to  do  such  a  thing  twice.  A  round 
shot,  however,  later  in  the  day  came  in  the  same  direction. 
Then  he  promised  that  he  would  move  that  very  evening, 
but  came  home  at  nine  o'clock  exhausted.  He  flung  him- 
self upon  his  bed,  and  said  he  would  get  a  little  rest,  and 
then  see  about  moving  his  desk  and  papers. 

As  he  lay  on  his  bed  one  of  his  staff-officers  read  over  to 
him  a  paper  he  had  written.  Sir  Henry  was  in  the  act  of 
suggesting  some  improvements,  when  a  shot  struck  the  room, 
brought  down  the  punkah,  and  stunned  the  younger  officer, 
who,  as  soon  as  he  could  recover  himself,  cried  out,  "  Are 
you  hurt,  Sir  Henry?"  The  answer  came  in  a  low  voice, 
"I  am  killed."  When  help  came,  the  bed  was  found  all 
crimson  with  his  blood. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  28 1 

They  moved  him  at  once  into  the  veranda  of  the  Resi- 
dency, for  coolness.  His  leg  was  shattered  near  the  hip,  and 
amputation  was  impossible.  All  that  could  be  done  was  to 
relieve  his  pain.  From  place  to  place  they  moved  him,  as 
the  continued  bombardment  knocked  down  the  walls.  On 
the  morning  of  the  4th  of  July,  1857,  he  quietly  died,  hav- 
ing previously  received  the  Holy  Communion,  with  his 
nephew  and  other  loved  friends  round  him.  He  left  minute 
directions  regarding  the  conduct  of  the  defence,  begging  his 
successor  earnestly  never  to  give  in.  He  sent  for  officers  in 
the  garrison  of  whom  he  was  most  fond,  told  them  what  he 
expected  of  them,  and  spoke  of  the  future.  He  also  sent 
for  all  those  whom  he  thought  he  had  ever,  though  uninten- 
tionally, injured,  or  even  spoken  harshly  to,  and  asked  their 
forgiveness.  At  intervals  he  spoke  a  good  deal  of  his  dead 
wife,  repeating  texts  she  had  been  fond  of.  "  He  was 
buried,"  says  his  nephew,  "  in  the  churchyard  where  all  the 
rest  were  ;  but  there  was  no  one  but  the  clergyman  to  attend, 
as  the  place  was  under  fire,  and  every  one  at  his  post." 

General  Sir  John  Inglis,  who  succeeded  Sir  Henry  in  the 
command,  says  :  — 

"  The  successful  defence  of  this  position  has  been,  under 
Providence,  solely  attributable  to  the  foresight  which  he  evinced 
in  timely  commencement  of  the  necessary  operations,  and  the 
great  skill  and  personal  activity  which  he  exhibited  in  carrying 
them  into  effect.  All  ranks  possessed  such  confidence  in  his 
judgment  and  fertility  of  resources  that  the  news  of  his  fall  was 
received  throughout  the  garrison  with  feelings  of  consternation 
as  well  as  of  grief,  inspired  in  the  hearts  of  all  by  the  loss  of  a 
public  benefactor  and  a  warm  personal  friend." 

While  he  was  still  living  (though  he  never  heard  of  it), 
Government  had  appointed  him  Governor-General  of  India 
pro  tern.,  to  succeed  Lord  Canning,  if  anything  happened  to 
him.  His  brother  John,  Lord  Lawrence,  was  subsequently 
Governor- General.  One  deeply  regrets  that  Sir  Henry  did 
not  know  of  his  own  appointment.  It  would  have  soothed 
his  feelings,  which  had  never  recovered  from  the  pain 


282  ENGLAND   IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

inflicted  by  his  removal  from  the  Punjaub  after  his  dissen- 
sion with  his  younger  brother.  Some  years  after  his  death 
a  plain  tombstone  was  put  up  to  him  in  the  churchyard  of 
Lucknow,  and  a  space  has  been  appropriated  for  a  monument 
to  him  hi  St.  Paul's.  He  left  three  orphan  children,  the 
eldest  of  whom,  Alexander,  was  made  a  baronet  in  recog- 
nition of  the  services  of  his  father.  He  died  of  an 
accident  in  Northern  India,  and  his  brother,  Henry  Wal- 
demar,  is  the  present  baronet.  Sir  Henry's  third  child  was 
a  little  girl. 

This  chapter  has  told  of  the  outbreak  of  the  Mutiny,  of 
the  terror  of  all,  of  the  sufferings  of  all,  but  most  of  the 
sufferings  of  the  women  and  children,  and  those  who  suf- 
fered for  them. 

We  leave  Delhi  in  the  hands  of  its  Mohammedan  rep- 
resentative of  the  Great  Mogul,  with  Native  troops  from 
every  part  of  India  gathered  in  its  defence,  and  British 
troops  and  Sikhs  and  Punjaubees  marching  to  besiege 
them.  The  citadel  at  Agra  was  still  held  by  the  English, 
but  was  threatened  by  the  rebels,  and  its  garrison  and  its 
women  were  shut  up  in  very  restricted  quarters,  overlooking 
the  city.  Cawnpore  was  in  the  hands  of  Nana  Sahib,  and 
under  him  was  the  one  Native  chief  who  had  shown  gen- 
eralship, Tantia  Topi.  General  Sir  Hugh  Wheeler  and  his 
garrison  had  been  murdered,  but  the  English  women  and 
children  were  living  still. 

Oude  was  in  revolt,  with  the  English  shut  up  in  Lucknow 
in  the  Residency.  Calcutta  was  disquieted,  but  not  rebel- 
lious. The  Presidencies  of  Bombay  and  Madras  had  no 
means  of  giving  help,  but  had  given  little  trouble.  The 
Punjaub  was  loyal,  and  its  aid  to  the  English  was  beyond 
all  praise.  Sir  Colin  Campbell  (afterwards  Lord  Clyde), 
the  Highland  hero  of  the  Crimea,  was  on  his  way  from 
England  to  take  the  supreme  military  command.  Lord 
Canning,  son  of  George  Canning,  who  died  Prime  Minister 
of  England  thirty  years  before,  was  Governor- General. 
Havelock  and  Outram  had  just  reached  Calcutta  with  rein- 
forcements of  British  troops  brought  back  from  Persia. 


S/A'    COLIN   CAMPftRLL. 

{Lord   Clyde.)    . 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  283 

English  soldiers  on  their  way  to  China  had  been  stopped 
on  their  voyage,  and  the  gallant  Captain  William  Peel,  R.  N., 
son  of  Sir  Robert,  was  making  ready  his  naval  brigade  to 
do  splendid  service.  Women  and  children  were  still  wan- 
dering in  the  jungle,  preferring  to  trust  the  tender  mercies 
of  wild  beasts  to  being  captured  by  the  rebels. 

All  this  was  in  the  month  of  July,  1857  ;  but  help  was  at 
hand.  Succor  was  soon  to  reach  Agra  and  Delhi.  The 
darkest  pages  of  the  tragedy  (save  one)  have  now  been 
written  ;  for  in  August  the  thunder-cloud  began  to  turn  its 
silver  lining  to  the  night,  and  before  Christmas  the  Mutiny 
was  over. 


CHAPTER  XI. 
THE  INDIAN  MUTINY  (Continued). 

r"THE  last  chapter  told  of  the  early  stages  of  the  Indian 
•*•       Mutiny  in  the  spring  and  summer  months  of  1857; 
this  is  to  tell  principally  of  its  collapse,  and  of  the  return  of 
Anglo-Indians  to  peace  and  security. 

But  before  we  reach  this  peace,  we  have  to  tell  of  the 
great  and  terrible  massacre  of  the  prisoners  at  Cawnpore  ; 
of  the  capture  of  Delhi ;  of  the  defence  of  Lucknow ;  of 
Havelock  ;  of  Outram  ;  of  Sir  Colin  Campbell  (Lord  Clyde)  ; 
of  Nana  Sahib  ;  and,  finally,  of  the  pacification  of  Bengal 
and  Oude,  and  the  extinction  of  John  Company,  —  the 
familiar  name  by  which  the  East  India  Company  was 
called. 

We  have  seen  how  the  last  days  of  Sir  Henry  Lawrence 
at  Lucknow  were  harassed  by  beseeching  letters  from  Sir 
Hugh  Wheeler,  shut  up  in  an  indefensible  position  at  Cawn- 
pore ;  we  have  read  the  old  General's  last  despairing  letter, 
written  beside  the  mangled  corpse  of  his  dear  son ;  and  we 
have  seen  how  Sir  Henry  answered  it,  cheering  him  by 
hopes  that  an  English  army  was  coming  up  to  his  relief  from 
Allahabad,  and  urging  him  to  put  no  faith  in  Nana  Sahib. 
This  letter  poor  Wheeler  never  received. 

He  was  seventy-five  years  of  age ;  a  brave,  good  man, 
an  Anglo-Indian  general  of  the  old  school.  When  the 
mutineers  flocked  into  Cawnpore,  and  his  Native  troops 
mutinied,  he  shut  himself  up  with  his  Europeans  in  a  small 
building  with  low  mud  walls,  outside  the  town. 

Some  weeks  before,  finding  that  timely  help  was  hardly 
likely  to  be  had  from  his  own  countrymen,  poor  Sir  Hugh 
Wheeler  bethought  him  of  a  man  who  he  was  sure  would 
be  ready  to  give  him  assistance,  —  a  man  who  was  rich, 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  285 

powerful,  and  most  hospitable  to  the  English,  and  who  lived 
about  twelve  miles  from  Cawnpore,  at  Bithoor.  This  man's 
name  was  Dundoo  Punt ;  but  history  knows  him  as  Nana 
Sahib. 

The  Mahratta  chief,  the  Peishwar  of  Bithoor,  who  had 
adopted  him,  had  been  deposed  early  in  the  century  by  the 
English,  but  enjoyed  an  enormous  pension  from  the  British 
Government,  assigned  him  for  his  support  and  that  of  his 
family.  He  also  retained  the  title  of  Peishwar. 

The  Hindoos,  both  by  law  and  custom,  attach  great  im- 
portance to  adoption.  Lord  Dalhousie,  in  every  case  that 
came  before  him,  made  very  light  of  it.  He  insisted  that  the 
old  Rajah  Rao's  pension  was  only  for  his  life.  The  Nana 
claimed  that  it  was  not  for  life  only,  but  should  descend  to 
his  adopted  son.  Which  was  right  and  which  was  wrong, 
has  never  been  satisfactorily  determined.  It  may  be  said, 
however,  that  the  treatment  of  the  Nana  was  not  liberal. 
But  he  was  a  rich  man,  notwithstanding,  having  inherited  the 
immense  savings  of  his  adopted  father,  and  he  settled  down 
into  his  palace  at  Bithoor,  friendly — very  friendly,  to  all 
appearances  —  with  his  English  neighbors.  Meantime  he 
sent  an  agent  to  England  to  represent  him  there,  and  to 
urge  his  claims  to  the  pension  that  the  Governor-General 
refused  him.  This  agent  was  a  very  handsome  young 
Mohammedan,  Azimoolah  Khan.  He  had  been  footman 
or  butler  in  an  Anglo-Indian  family,  and  had  learned  a 
great  deal  about  English  ways.  Nothing  delights  fashion- 
able, lion-hunting  London  more  than  a  picturesque  foreign 
celebrity  to  be  feted  at  the  height  of  the  season.  We  all 
remember  Thackeray's  picture  in  the  "  Newcomes  "  of  the 
rascally  Rummun  Loll,  surrounded  by  English  beauties  in  an 
English  drawing-room.  Such  a  fate  had  Azimoolah  Khan. 
He  became  the  leading  lion  of  the  season  in  1854.  He 
persuaded  himself  that  half  the  aristocratic  beauties  of  Lon- 
don were  over  head  and  ears  in  love  with  him.  He  did  not 
succeed  in  securing  the  Nana's  pension,  but  he  went  back 
to  India  via  Constantinople  and  the  Crimea,  where  he  told 
loathsome  stories  to  English  officers  of  the  impression  he 


286    ENGLAND   IN   THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

had  produced  on  English  ladies,  and  imbibed  an  idea,  from 
the  Press  and  from  what  he  saw  in  1855,  that  the  power  of 
England  was  on  the  wane,  and  her  resources  exhausted  by 
the  Crimean  war. 

This  idea  he  imparted  to  his  Nana,  who,  with  vengeance 
in  his  heart  against  the  English,  smilingly  bided  his  time. 
No  Native  prince  was  so  hospitable,  nor,  to  all  appearance, 
so  friendly ;  and  the  ladies  and  gentlemen  at  Cavvnpore 
were  delighted  to  be  invited  to  behold  and  share  the 
luxurious  splendors  of  the  palace  where  he  lived  ;  rather 
fat  for  his  age,  which  was  thirty-six,  and  given  over,  to  all 
appearance,  to  indolence  and  luxurious  living.  However, 
as  soon  as  Sir  Hugh  Wheeler  called  upon  him,  he  hastened 
to  his  assistance  at  Cawnpore.  This  was  at  the  close  of 
May.  A  few  days  after  he  reached  Cawnpore  he  joined 
the  rebel  army,  making  a  pretence  of  being  captured  by  the 
Sepoys  and  forced  to  adopt  their  cause.  I  have  already 
told  how  on  the  last  of  June  or  the  first  of  July  he  mur- 
dered the  fugitives  in  the  boats  who  were  escaping  from 
Futtehghur.  That  murder  was  perpetrated  within  a  few  days 
of  his  greater  atrocity. 

The  little  party  under  Sir  Hugh  Wheeler  consisted  of 
about  one  thousand  persons,  —  465  men,  280  grown 
women,  and  about  the  same  number  of  little  children.  A 
great  many  of  the  men  were  railroad  and  telegraph  em- 
ployees, who  fought  bravely,  —  indeed,  the  bravery  and 
endurance  of  all  that  hapless  little  band,  shut  up  in  their 
crumbling  ruin,  with  absolutely  no  shelter  either  from  sun, 
musketry,  or  cannon-shot,  was  something  wonderful.  All 
their  sufferings  were  aggravated  by  the  fact  that  every  drop 
of  water  had  to  be  drawn  from  the  well  under  a  sharp  fire 
from  the  enemy. 

On  June  27,  Sir  Hugh  Wheeler  received  an  offer  of  pro- 
tection from  Nana  Sahib,  whom  he  still  conceived  to  be  (up 
to  a  certain  point)  his  personal  friend.  The  Nana  promised, 
if  he  would  surrender,  to  provide  boats  and  rowers,  and  to 
take  the  garrison  all  down  the  Ganges  to  Allahabad.  What 
followed  is  believed  to  have  been  largely  the  suggestion  of 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  287 

Azimoolah  Khan,  that  polished  lion  of  the  London  drawing- 
rooms. 

The  women  and  children  of  the  garrison,  and  the  sick 
and  wounded,  had  embarked,  and  the  men  were  getting 
into  the  boats,  when  suddenly  a  trumpet  blew.  At  that 
signal  one  of  the  boatmen  on  board  each  boat  set  fire  to 
the  awning  of  thatch  that  protected  the  deck  from  the  sun. 
The  moment  these  awnings  were  in  a  blaze,  on  all  sides 
came  a  fire  upon  the  boats,  not  only  of  musketry,  but  of 
cannon  placed  in  position.  The  men  were  all  shot  down. 
The  majority  of  the  women  —  wounded,  terrified,  heart- 
broken —  were  then  re-landed,  and  marched  back  into 
Cawnpore,  where  they  were  confined  for  the  night.  One 
boat  escaped ;  but  it  was  fired  at  all  along  the  river  bank, 
until  at  last  twelve  brave  men  landed,  determined  to  drive 
back  their  assailants.  The  boat  was  captured  before  they 
could  get  back  to  her,  and  nearly  a  hundred  women  and 
children  were  carried  back  to  Cawnpore.  Of  the  twelve 
men  who  had  landed,  four  escaped,  —  the  only  survivors  of 
the  Cawnpore  garrison ;  and  these  four  endured  incredible 
sufferings  and  went  through  numerous  adventures  before 
they  reached  a  place  of  safety. 

The  women  were  shut  up  in  the  old  barracks.  Daily 
some  were  brought  out  and  made  to  grind  corn  for  their 
captors ;  but,  as  Mr.  Justin  McCarthy  says,  "  They  were 
doomed  .one  and  all  to  suffer  death  ;  but  they  were  not,  as 
at  one  time  was  believed  in  England,  made  to  long  for 
death  as  an  escape  from  shame." 

The  wives  of  the  old  Peishwar  (the  same  who  had 
adopted  Nana  Sahib)  were  in  Cawnpore,  and,  be  it  said 
to  the  honor  of  womanhood,  they  did  all  in  their  power  to 
protect  the  unfortunate  English  women. 

At  this  juncture,  General  Havelock  landed  at  Calcutta, 
on  his  return  from  a  campaign  in  Persia,  where  England 
had  been  carrying  on  a  "  little  war "  around  the  walls  of 
Herat.  The  very  day  after  he  reached  Calcutta  he  was 
placed  in  command  of  a  column  ready  to  be  sent  at  once 
to  the  succor  of  Lucknow  and  Cawnpore. 


288    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Havelock  had  for  many  years  ardently  desired  a  supreme 
command.  At  last  his  hour  had  come,  but  too  late  to 
enable  him  to  succor  Sir  Hugh  Wheeler.  He  reached 
Benares,  on  his  way  from  Calcutta  to  Allahabad,  the  day 
that  the  massacre  took  place  at  Cawnpore. 

Of  the  difficulties  and  the  distances  that  had  to  be  sur- 
mounted in  any  communication  between  Cawnpore  and 
Calcutta,  I  will  tell  a  little  later ;  now  I  will  not  interrupt 
the  narrative. 

Havelock  had  no  cavalry,  but  he  formed  a  corps  of  vol- 
unteer horsemen,  —  civilians,  railroad  and  telegraph  men, 
shopkeepers,  and  officers  whose  regiments  had  mutinied 
and  who  had  escaped  from  their  men.  Fighting  every  inch 
of  his  way,  twice  winning  two  battles  in  one  day,  each  time 
engaging  with  his  whole  force,  he  reached  the  outskirts  of 
Cawnpore.  There  he  fought  a  final  battle,  and  drove  the 
Nana  Sahib  and  his  troops  out  of  the  town. 

The  first  act  of  the  conquerors  was  to  rush  to  the  old 
barracks  where  they  had  learned  from  spies  that  the  ladies 
and  children  were  confined  ;  and  there  such  a  sight  met 
their  eyes  as  never  had  been  before  recorded  in  the  annals 
of  English  warfare. 

The  day  before,  the  three  or  four  men  still  left  alive 
among  this  band  of  over  two  hundred  English  women  and 
children  were  called  out  and  shot.  Then  some  Sepoys 
were  sent  to  the  spot,  and  ordered  to  fire  through  the  win- 
dows at  the  women  and  children.  It  is  thought  that  the 
hearts  of  these  men  had  some  compassion,  and  that  they 
aimed  high  purposely,  to  avoid  killing  their  defenceless 
victims.  At  any  rate,  the  bullet-marks  on  the  walls  indi- 
cate this. 

In  the  evening,  five  men  (two  Hindoo  peasants,  two 
Mohammedan  butchers,  and  one  a  soldier  of  Nana  Sahib) 
were  sent  to  the  place  to  murder  every  woman  and  child 
remaining  alive.  Shrieks  upon  shrieks  were  heard  by  those 
without,  but  no  one  knows  what  passed  in  those  dreadful 
shambles.  Twice  the  Mohammedan  soldier  came  out  and 
exchanged  his  reeking,  broken  sword  for  a  keener  one; 


THE   INDIAN  MUTINY.  289 

then  all  sounds  ceased,  the  five  men  left  the  place,  the 
door  was  closed.  But  when  it  was  opened  in  the  morning, 
a  few  were  found  still  living.  They  were  dragged  forth,  — 
the  dead  and  those  not  quite  dead,  —  and  thrown  into  a 
well.  Some  little  children  had  still  strength  enough  to  try 
to  get  away.  When  Havelock's  men  entered  the  building 
where  the  massacre  took  place,  the  pavement  was  still 
slippery  with  blood,  and  fragments  of  ladies'  and  children's 
dresses  lay  soaking  in  it,  with  bonnets,  collars,  combs,  and 
children's  frocks  and  frills.  On  the  pillars  were  deep 
sword-cuts,  from  which,  in  several  places,  hung  tresses  of 
fair  hair.  Proceeding  in  their  search,  the  soldiers  found 
human  limbs  bristling  from  a  well  in  the  garden.  The 
dead,  who  had  been  thrown  into  it,  filled  it  to  the  brim. 
Men  of  the  strongest  nerve  burst  into  tears ;  and  what 
wonder  that  every  savage  instinct  in  men's  hearts  was 
roused  to  mad  revenge?  Two  hundred  and  twelve  was 
the  number  of  those  massacred  in  the  barracks,  besides 
those  who  perished  in  the  river,  and  the  432  men. 

There  was  a  story,  afterwards  circulated,  that  an  in- 
scription had  been  found  upon  the  whitewashed  walls  of 
the  dreadful  place,  invoking  vengeance  on  the  murderers. 
But  this  was  not  so.  Some  one  had  disgraced  him- 
self by  adding  it  afterwards,  to  stimulate  the  thirst  for 
revenge. 

The  dreadful  well  has  been  filled  up ;  the  tender  bodies 
were  buried ;  the  barracks  have  been  pulled  down ;  and 
a  memorial  chapel,  surrounded  by  a  beautiful  garden,  has 
been  erected  on  the  spot. 

As  to  Nana  Sahib,  his  army  was  defeated  four  months 
later  by  the  English,  and  no  one  ever  knew  what  afterwards 
became  of  him.  Utterly  routed,  he  galloped,  on  a  wounded 
and  exhausted  horse,  through  Cawnpore,  and  made  his  way 
to  his  own  palace  at  Bithoor.  He  there  paused  long 
enough  to  order  the  murder  of  a  fugitive  Englishwoman 
who  had  fallen  into  the  hands  of  his  people,  and  then 
he  took  flight  in  the  direction  of  Nepaul.  Never  has  he 
been  again  heard  of.  Years  after,  the  English  thought  that 

19 


290    ENGLAND  IN  THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

they  had  captured  him,  but  it  proved  that  they  had  caught 
a  wrong  man.  Tantia  Topi,  his  lieutenant,  a  brave  man 
and  a  good  general,  whose  hands,  as  far  as  history  knows, 
were  free  from  the  blood  shed  in  this  horrible  massacre, 
was  hunted  for  months  from  place  to  place,  suffering  defeat 
after  defeat.  He  was  betrayed  to  the  English  at  last,  by 
a  man  whom  he  had  trusted,  and  was  hanged.  He  might 
better  have  been  spared.  He  had  never  been  in  the 
service  of  the  English,  and  owed  them  neither  allegiance 
nor  fidelity.  As  for  Azimoolah  Khan,  I  never  heard  what 
befell  him.  I  trust  it  is  not  un- Christian  to  hope  that  he 
met  with  his  deserts. 

We  may  now  pause,  leaving  Havelock  in  possession  of 
Cawnpore,  and  take  up  the  story  of  the  siege  of  Delhi, 
before  we  go  on  to  describe  the  relief  of  Lucknow,  or  the 
subsequent  operations  of  Lord  Clyde. 

The  cry  of  every  rebel  regiment  the  moment  it  got  rid 
of  its  English  officers  was,  "  To  Delhi !  "  Had  the  first 
mutineers  at  Meerut  been  cut  down,  as  it  was  thought  they 
might  have  been  by  vigorous  action,  before  reaching  Delhi, 
it  is  probable  that  the  rebellion,  if  not  the  Mutiny,  might 
have  lacked  a  head.  The  old  Emperor  living  at  Delhi  in 
his  palace,  with  the  English  Resident,  Mr.  Frazer,  to  con- 
duct his  affairs,  was  eighty-two  years  old.  The  mutineers 
from  Meerut  swarmed  into  his  capital,  murdered  the  Resi- 
dent, and  insisted  on  proclaiming  him  the  successor  of 
Aurungzebe.  There  is  no  evidence  that  the  old  man  had 
anything  to  do  with  the  outbreak  of  the  rebellion  ;  but  when 
"  greatness  was  thrust  upon  him,"  he  did  not  decline  it,  but 
put  himself  at  the  head  of  the  political  movement  to  over- 
throw the  power  of  the  English  in  India. 

There  was  no  possibility  of  sending  up  an  English  army 
from  Calcutta  to  recapture  Delhi ;  but  an  army,  and  every- 
thing needful  for  its  support,  was  provided  by  Sir  John 
Lawrence  in  the  Punjaub.  He  perceived  that  Delhi  was 
the  keystone  to  the  arch  of  the  rebellion ;  and  while  many 
were  urging  him  to  look  first  to  his  hold  on  his  own  province, 
he  hurried  forward  every  available  man  and  gun  to  Delhi. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  291 

Even  the  inflammatory  elements  of  society  in  the  Punjaub 
were  turned  to  good  service.  The  old  gunners  who  had 
fought  the  English  nine  years  before  were  called  from  their 
ploughs  to  fight  England's  enemies ;  low-caste  Sikhs  were 
enrolled  as  sappers  ;  chiefs  who  had  "  been  out "  in  the  '48 
and  '49  against  the  English,  were  summoned,  with  their  fol- 
lowings,  and  sent  off  to  Delhi.  It  was  also  a  great  thing  for 
the  English  that  they  had  the  electric  telegraph  connecting 
Lahore  with  Calcutta  still  in  their  hands. 

The  siege  of  Delhi  was  long,  and  more  than  once  the 
situation  became  doubtful.  The  first  general  of  the  army, 
General  Anson,  died  of  cholera ;  the  second,  General 
Barnard,  died  also  of  cholera;  General  Reid  succeeded 
him,  and  in  a  month  was  invalided  to  the  Hills.  One  of 
the  most  brilliant  soldiers  Lawrence  sent  to  Delhi  was 
Nicholson,  —  a  very  Achilles  for  bravery;  and  not  unlike 
Achilles  in  haughty  unwillingness  to  render  obedience  to 
any  one  who  in  his  judgment  was  an  incapable  superior. 

General  Wilson  took  the  command  after  Anson,  Barnard, 
and  Reid  had  succumbed  to  illness ;  and  General  Baird 
Smith,  a  man  of  far  more  energy,  commanded  the  engineers. 

The  siege  of  Delhi  lasted  from  May  to  the  latter  days  of 
September.  The  English  force  engaged  was  eight  thousand 
seven  hundred  men,  of  whom  a  little  more  than  one  in  three 
were  Europeans.  Delhi  was  a  city  seven  miles  in  circum- 
ference ;  it  was  filled  with  an  immense  fanatical  Mohamme- 
dan population  ;  it  was  garrisoned  by  forty  thousand  soldiers, 
all  armed  and  disciplined  in  the  English  service,  with  one 
hundred  and  fourteen  pieces  of  heavy  artillery  mounted  on 
the  walls,  besides  sixty  smaller  pieces,  served  by  trained 
artillerymen.  It  had  also  had  immense  stores  of  ammuni- 
tion laid  up  by  the  English  ;  but  the  arsenal  had  been  blown 
up  when  the  Mutiny  began,  by  self-devoted  Englishmen. 
The  city  was  so  well  prepared  to  stand  a  siege  that  General 
Wilson  desponded  from  the  first.  In  every  despatch  he 
wrote  that  Havelock  or  some  other  general  must  be  sent 
from  the  south  to  help  him ;  but  the  arrival  of  such  relief 
was  utterly  impossible.  Havelock  and  Outram  had  their 


ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

hands  full,  and  over-full,  and  Delhi  had  to  fall  before  the 
English  force  besieging  it,  or  not  at  all. 

General  Wilson  thought  not  at  all.  So  did  not  General 
Baird  Smith,  who,  wounded,  and  prostrated  by  scurvy  and 
dysentery,  still  kept  up  his  spirit,  and,  assisted  by  a  gallant 
officer,  Alec  Taylor,  kept  continual  watch  over  everything 
in  his  department. 

At  last  General  Wilson,  urged  vehemently  by  Baird  Smith, 
and  seeing  nothing  better  to  be  done,  consented  to  sanc- 
tion an  assault  early  in  September.  The  attack  by  artillery 
began  on  September  7,  and  by  September  1 2  it  was  thought 
that  two  breaches  had  been  made  in  the  city  walls.  Then 
two  parties  volunteered  to  reconnoitre.  One  of  them  con- 
sisted of  eight  men ;  six  of  them  privates,  and  two  officers. 
They  started  at  ten  at  night.  It  was  bright  starlight,  but  no 
moon.  As  they  were  about  leaving  the  camp,  a  shell  exploded 
near  them,  and  covered  them  with  dust.  They  sprang  to 
their  feet,  drew  their  swords,  and,  feeling  that  their  revolvers 
were  ready  at  hand,  started  into  the  enemy's  country. 
They  reached  the  edge  of  the  ditch  that  surrounded  the 
wall  of  Delhi :  not  a  soul  was  to  be  seen.  Four  of  them 
slid  down  into  the  moat.  In  a  few  moments  more  they 
would  have  reached  the  breach ;  but,  unhappily,  they  had 
not  been  quite  noiseless.  They  saw  men  running.  They 
knew  they  had  been  seen.  They  therefore  climbed  out  of 
the  ditch,  and  hid  themselves  in  the  long  grass,  whence,  as 
they  watched,  they  could  see  a  file  of  men  loading  their 
muskets  to  fire  at  them.  They  did  not  neglect  even  at  this 
moment  to  examine  the  breach.  They  saw  that  it  was 
large,  easy  of  ascent,  and  with  no  guns  on  the  flanks. 
Then,  finding  that  they  could  not  hope  to  approach  nearer, 
they  sprang  to  their  feet  at  a  given  signal,  and  started  for 
their  own  lines  at  a  full  run.  The  fire  that  pursued-  them 
was  very  lively,  but  happily  they  escaped.  On  their  report, 
and  that  of  two  officers  who  had  examined  the  other 
breach,  an  assault  was  ordered  for  daybreak  the  following 
morning.  Major  Nicholson,  the  hero  of  the  campaign,  was 
placed  in  command  of  the  column  that  was  to  attack  the 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  293 

breach  that  the  eight  volunteers  had  reconnoitred.     Three 
other  columns  were  directed  against  other  points. 

"  It  was  three  in  the  morning,"  says  Colonel  Malleson,  the 
historian  of  the  Mutiny;  "the  columns  of  assault  were  in  the 
leash.  In  a  few  moments  they  would  be  slipped.  What  would 
be  the  result?  The  moment  was  supreme.  Would  the  skill 
and  daring  of  the  soldiers  of  England  triumph  against  superior 
numbers,  defending  and  defended  by  stone  walls  ?  Or  would 
rebellion,  triumphing  over  the  assailants,  turn  its  triumph  to  still 
greater  account,  by  inciting  by  its  means  to  its  aid  the  Punjaub 
and  other  parts  of  India  still  quivering  in  the  balance?  That 
indeed  was  the  question.  Delhi  was  in  itself  the  smallest  of 
the  results  to  be  gained  by  a  successful  assault.  The  fate  of 
India  was  in  the  balance.  Tlie  repulse  of  the  British  would 
entail  the  rising  of  the  Punjaub." 

The  assault  took  place  at  daybreak ;  and  by  evening  of 
the  next  day  the  English,  after  a  fierce  struggle,  had  gained 
the  outer  portion  of  the  city.  Several  days  of  desper- 
ate street-fighting  followed.  The  palace  was  reached ;  its 
gates  were  blown  open  with  gunpowder ;  a  few  fanatics 
who  had  remained  in  it  were  slaughtered.  The  British 
flag  was  hoisted,  and  the  city  of  the  Moguls,  now  resem- 
bling a  city  of  the  dead,  was  in  the  hands  of  the  English 
conquerors. 

"And  then  we  thought  on  vengeance ;  and  all  along  our  van, 
'  Remember  Englishwomen's  wrongs!'  was  passed  from  man  to  man." 

The  General  had  issued  an  order  to  show  no  mercy  to  men, 
but  to  spare  women  and  children. 

There  was  with  the  army  at  Delhi,  Colonel  Hodson,  of 
Hodson's  Horse,  a  man  born  with  all  the  characteristics 
of  a  condottiere  of  the  Middle  Ages ;  with  all  the  daring, 
personal  magnetism,  generalship,  and  self-devotion  of  that 
class  of  men ;  with  their  reckless  indifference  to  human 
life  (their  own  inclusive)  ;  with  a  taste  for  rough  and  ready 
justice,  —  or  injustice,  as  the  case  might  be,  —  and  for 
gain  or  plunder  wherever  or  however  it  could  be  won. 
Hodson  had  real  pleasure  in  vengeance.  His  feet  were 


294    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

swift  to  shed  blood.  With  all  this,  he  was  loved  by  his 
friends1  (no  man  ever  had  a  nobler  set  of  them),  and  he 
was  adored  by  those  nearer  and  dearer  to  him.  "  He  was 
one  of  those  strangely  mixed  characters  that  may  not  be 
imitated,  but  must  stand  before  the  bar  at  the  Great  Assize 
before  they  can  be  judged." 

He  was  a  clergyman's  son,  born  in  England  in  1821. 
He  was  at  Rugby  before  the  time  of  Dr.  Arnold,  and  was 
distinguished  there  by  his  love  of  discipline,  ruling  with 
high-handed  justice,  and  in  the  interest  of  boys. who  were 
oppressed,  in  his  own  division  of  the  school.  He  went  to 
college,  but  his  desire  was  for  soldiership.  On  reaching 
India  he  became  a  great  favorite  with  Sir  Henry  Lawrence. 
He  gave  his  hero-worship  to  Sir  Charles  Napier ;  he  was 
the  intimate  friend  of  Robert  Napier  (since  Lord  Napier 
of  Magdala).  Everything  he  did,  he  did  well;  and  words 
were  weak  in  which  these  men  would  praise  him.  In  1847 
he  was  put  second  in  command  over  an  irregular  corps  of 
Punjaubee  cavalry,  called  the  Guides.  "  They  included 
men  of  many  races,  many  creeds.  Notorious  criminals 
and  dare-devil  highwaymen  were  to  be  found  among 
them.  Indeed,  no  questions  were  asked  a  candidate  for 
enlistment,  as  to  character;  he  needed  only  to  show 
that  he  had  a  thorough  knowledge  of  the  roads,  rivers, 
resources,  and  mountain-passes  of  the  district  in  which 
he  lived." 

With  these  men  Hodson  did  admirable  service  in  the 
Second  Sikh  War  (1846-47).  In  1852  he  was  married  to 
a  lady  he  had  loved  some  years,  and  whom  he  continued  all 
his  life  to  love  devotedly.  He  had  quitted  the  Guides  be- 
fore this,  but  soon  after,  he  was  appointed  to  the  chief 
command  of  them.  "  I  am  the  luckiest  man  on  the  whole 
earth,"  he  wrote  exultingly.  But,  alas  !  he  was  extravagant 
by  nature,  and  was  soon  deep  in  debt,  —  a  state  of  things 
sadly  common  among  young  officers  in  India. 

We  need  not  linger  over  the  sad  story.  He  was  accused 
of  misappropriating  the  regimental  funds.  He  was  tried 
for  it,  and  dismissed  from  his  command.  The  very  week 
1  See  note  on  page  442. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  295 

this  scandal  was  made  public,  he  had  lost  his  only  child. 
Not  only  was  he  accused  of  dishonorable  money  trans- 
actions, but  of  high-handed  injustice  in  the  exercise  of  his 
authority. 

He  was  sent  back  as  a  subaltern  to  his  regiment,  after 
ten  years  of  distinguished  and  independent  command. 
Then  the  Mutiny  broke  out,  and  Hodson  was  wild  for 
employment.  All  the  former  charges  against  him  were 
overlooked,  —  he  was  a  man  whose  services  in  that  emer- 
gency would  be  so  splendid  and  valuable  ! 

Splendid  and  valuable  they  were.  He  was  authorized  to 
raise  a  regiment  of  irregular  cavalry,  —  Hodson's  Horse. 
He  was  replaced  in  command  of  his  old  regiment,  the 
Guides.  All  the  spy  service  of  the  army  before  Delhi 
was  intrusted  to  him ;  and  it  was  so  well  conducted  that 
the  officers  before  Delhi  used  to  say  that  Hodson  knew 
every  day  what  the  King  of  Delhi  had  for  dinner.  Then 
came  the  bombardment,  the  assault  upon  the  city,  and 
the  victory. 

But  the  old  King  of  Delhi  had  escaped,  and  had  taken 
refuge  in  a  magnificent  mausoleum,  the  tomb  of  the  Em- 
peror Hoomayoon,  a  few  miles  from  Delhi.  One  of  his  gen- 
erals, who  was  making  off  with  the  remains  of  the  defeated 
forces  to  the  hills,  urged  him  to  go  with  them.  But  the  old 
man  had  two  evil  counsellors,  —  a  young  wife  who  dreaded 
hardships,  and  a  treacherous  vizier  who  hoped  to  make  his 
own  peace  with  the  English  by  delivering  his  master  into 
their  hands.  This  man  communicated  with  one  of  Hod- 
son's  chief  spies,  and  Hodson  went  to  General  Wilson  and 
asked  leave  to  arrest  the  King.  For  some  time  Wilson 
hesitated.  He  seems  habitually  to  have  hesitated  about 
everything.  At  last  it  was  settled  that  the  King  should  be 
promised  his  life  if  he  surrendered ;  and  Hodson  set  out 
with  fifty  of  his  troopers.  A  vast  crowd  was  round  the 
tomb  in  which  the  aged  King  had  taken  refuge,  with  his 
counsellors  and  his  zenana.  After  a  two-hours'  negotiation 
the  old  man  surrendered.  Hodson  took  away  his  arms, 
and  led  him  off  captive  to  await  his  trial. 


296    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  But  the  King's  three  sons  were  still  to  be  brought  to  their 
account.  Never  doubting  that  these  men  had  hounded  on  the 
murderers  of  the  English  ladies  and  children,  Hodson  and  his 
companions  were  too  thoroughly  possessed  by  the  desire  for 
their  condign  punishment  to  think  of  asking  for  proofs  of  their 
guilt.  Hodson,  therefore,  resolved  to  go  and  capture  them,  as 
he  had  done  the  King.  At  first,  General  Wilson  would  not  give 
his  consent;  but  Hodson  was  importunate.  Nicholson,  from 
his  dying  bed,  where  he  lay  mortally  wounded,  vehemently 
supported  him;  and  General  Wilson  at  last  yielded.  At  eight 
o'clock  in  the  morning  Hodson  started  with  McDowell,  his 
lieutenant,  and  one  hundred  picked  men  of  his  own  regiment. 
Let  the  reader,"  continues  the  writer  from  whom  I  copy  this 
account,  "try  to  picture  to  himself  the  departing  cavalcade. 
Wild-looking  horsemen,  wearing  scarlet  turbans  and  dust- 
colored  tunics  bound  with  scarlet  sashes;  their  leader  a  tall, 
spare  man,  attired  like  them,  riding  his  horse  with  a  loose 
rein,  with  reddish-brown  hair  and  beard,  aquiline  nose,  thin, 
curved,  defiant  nostrils,  and  blue  eyes  which  seemed  aglow 
with  a  half-kindled  light. 

"  The  Princes  in  a  tomb  where  they  also  had  taken  refuge 
endeavored  to  stipulate  for  life,  Hodson  curtly  refused  to  make 
any  stipulation  at  all.  At  last  they  yielded.  Their  situation 
was  desperate,  and  their  last  hope  appeared  to  be  in  English 
mercy.  They  set  out  in  a  bullock-cart.  An  immense  crowd 
followed  them,  and  after  some  time  pressed  upon  their  escort, 
which  had  been  reduced  to  ten  troopers,  the  others  having 
been  sent  away.  There  is  little  doubt  that  Hodson  hoped  that 
some  attempt  at  a  rescue  might  give  him  an  excuse  for  despatch- 
ing his  prisoners  with  his  own  hand  ;  but  the  attempt  at  rescue 
was  not  made.  When  about  a  mile  from  Delhi  he  suddenly 
halted  his  party,  ordered  the  Princes  to  get  out  of  the  bullock- 
cart  and  strip  off  their  upper  garments;  then,  borrowing  a  car- 
bine from  one  of  his  troopers,  he  shot  them  all  three  dead.  '  I 
am  not  cruel,  but  I  confess  I  did  rejoice  in  ridding  the  earth  of 
these  wretches,'  he  wrote  that  very  evening  to  a  friend ;  and  he 
had  said  previously  that  'if  he  got  into  the  palace,  the  House 
of  Timour  would  not  be  worth  five  minutes'  purchase.'  " 

How  far  these  men  were  guilty  of  the  shedding  of  Eng- 
lish innocent  blood  in  Delhi  was  never  known,  their  sum- 
mary execution  having  prevented  any  investigation  of  their 
crimes.  Their  bodies  were  exposed  at  the  gate  of  Delhi 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  297 

for  some  days.  Their  valuables,  men  believed,  passed  into 
the  hands  of  their  slayer. 

The  old  King  of  Delhi  was  tried  and  condemned ;  but 
his  life  was  spared.  Government  sent  him  to  the  Cape  of 
Good  Hope ;  but  the  colonists  would  not  permit  him  to 
make  their  land  his  asylum.  He  was  brought  back  to  India, 
and  ended  his  days  at  Rangoon. 

Hodson  did  not  live  to  receive  censure  from  England,  or 
praise  for  his  unauthorized  violence  ;  though  the*  former  has 
since  been  lavished  on  him  freely,  especially  when  his  mur- 
der of  the  Princes  was  found  not  to  be  an  isolated  case  of 
red-handed  vengeance,  — unjust  vengeance  on  one  occasion 
on  a  man  who  had  once  stood  his  friend. 

For  two  weeks  after  the  death  of  the  Princes  of  Delhi 
Hodson  continued  with  the  victorious  army ;  then  he  was 
sent  to  clear  the  country  from  bands  of  rebels,  and  to  bring 
in  supplies.  He  did  his  work  effectually.  Next,  Sir  Colin 
Campbell,  prompted  by  Colonel  Seaton,  who  knew  Hodson 
well,  asked  for  his  services.  "  I  would  rather  have  him," 
said  Seaton,  "  than  five  hundred  men." 

In  storming  one  of  the  palaces  at  Lucknow,  in  March, 
1858,  under  Sir  Colin,  he  was  present,  though  it  was  not 
part  of  his  duty,  as  a  cavalry  officer,  to  be  there ;  besides 
which  he  was  imperfectly  cured  of  a  wound.  Attempting  to 
rush  with  his  sword  upon  a  group  of  rebels  hiding  in  a  dark 
passage,  he  was  urged  not  to  go  forward,  —  he  was  even 
withheld  forcibly  for  a  moment;  but  he  pushed  on,  and 
received  his  death-wound. 

"  There  must  have  been  something  that  was  noble  in  a  man 
so  loved  by  comrades  and  so  valued  by  superior  officers,  them- 
selves brave  soldiers  and  high-minded  and  Christian  men. 
Posterity  will  not,  indeed,  be  blinded  by  the  glamour  of  his  mil- 
itary exploits  ;  they  will  not  admit  him  to  a  place  among  the 
nobler  heroes  of  the  Indian  Mutiny  :  but  while  they  will  not  be 
able  to  forget  that  he  enriched  himself  by  dishonest  means,  and 
that,  heedless  of  justice,  of  gratitude,  and  even  of  honor,  he  was 
swift  to  shed  innocent  blood,  they  will  remember  that  he  was  also 
an  affectionate  son,  a  good  comrade,  a  tender  husband,  that  he 
rendered  brilliant  services  to  his  country,  and  that  he  died  fight 
ing  to  the  last  against  her  enemies." 


298    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

We  have  now  seen  Cawnpore  once  more  in  the  hands  of 
the  English,  and  Delhi  has  fallen,  —  thus  ending  any  political 
rebellion  as  typified  by  the  setting  up  of  a  new  Great  Mogul ; 
there  remains  now  the  suppression  of  the  Mutiny  in  Oude, 
together  with  the  relief  of  Lucknow,  its  second  siege,  and 
the  defeat  of  the  mutineers  gathered  between  it  and  Cawn- 
pore. The  heroes  of  this  second  part  of  our  history  are 
Havelock,  Outram,  Lord  Clyde,  and  Captain  William  Peel, 
R.  N.  (Sir  Robert's  son). 

It  was  July  4,  1857,  that  Sir  Henry  Lawrence  died  at 
Lucknow  ;  and  the  command  devolved  upon  General  Inglis, 
who,  with  Major  Banks,  had  enjoyed  to  the  fullest  extent  Sir 
Henry's  confidence.  Two  weeks  afterwards,  Major  Banks 
was  killed  by  a  bullet  through  his  head. 

It  would  not  be  possible  in  this  small  space  to  give  an 
account  of  the  military  operations  of  the  siege  of  the  Resi- 
dency at  Lucknow  by  the  Sepoys. 

Lucknow  was  a  long,  straggling  town  on  the  banks  of  the 
Goomtee,  a  tributary  of  the  Ganges.  In  it  there  were  a  num- 
ber of  palaces,  and  all  round  it  were  the  residences  of  the 
Oude  nobles,  surrounded  by  high  walls  and  by  beautiful  gar- 
dens. There  were,  besides,  many  mosques,  also  surrounded 
by  walls  and  flowers  and  groves.  Among  the  palaces  was  the 
Martiniere,  built  by  a  French  officer  named  Martin,  in  the 
service  of  a  former  King  of  Oude,  and  after  his  death  con- 
verted into  a  boys'  orphan  asylum.  There  was  the  Alum- 
baugh,  a  fortified  palace  about  two  miles  from  the  city; 
there  was  the  Muchee  Baum,  blown  up  by  Sir  Henry  Law- 
rence ;  there,  too,  was  the  Kaiserbaugh,  or  King's  Palace, 
with  a  beautiful  mosque  attached  to  it.  The  Residency  was 
also  surrounded1  by  a  high  wall,  and  stood  in  a  large  garden, 
with  other  houses  within  the  enclosure.  Into  this  Residency 
all  the  Europeans  and  all  the  faithful  among  the  native  troops 
were  crowded,  to  stand  a  siege.  The  place  was  commanded 
from  the  tops  of  several  mosques  and  many  religious  edifices, 
whence  sharpshooters  fired  down  into  the  enclosure  ;  for 
Sir  Henry  Lawrence  had  been  anxious  to  spare  holy  places 
as  well  as  private  property,  and  these  buildings  had  not  been 
destroyed.  From  them  proceeded  a  brisk  fire  of  musketry 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  299 

night  and  day.  The  commanding  General  estimated  that 
there  could  not  have  been  less  than  eight  thousand  men,  at 
any  one  time,  firing  into  the  English  position.  This  rendered 
every  part  of  the  Residency  unsafe.  The  sick  and  wounded 
were  killed  in  inner  rooms,  and  the  widow  of  Lieutenant 
Dorin  and  other  women  and  children  were  shot  dead  in 
places  where  it  was  supposed  no  bullet  could  reach  them. 
Besides  this,  the  enemy  brought  up  about  twenty-five  large 
cannon  and  planted  them  all  round  the  English  position, 
very  close  to  the  defences.  Had  the  rebels  only  had  the 
spirit  to  make  one  brilliant  dash,  all  might  have  fallen  into 
their  hands ;  but  they  were  Asiatics,  and  almost  leaderless, 
fighting  Europeans. 

This  firing  and  cannonading  was  kept  up  till  July  20,  the 
day  before  Major  Banks  was  killed.  On  that  day  the  rebels 
exploded  a  mine  and  attempted  an  assault,  but  were  driven 
back  at  every  point  with  great  slaughter.  They  then  re- 
sumed their  cannonading  and  their  musketry,  until  the 
loth  of  August. 

That  day  they  exploded  another  mine,  and  made  a 
breach  through  which  a  regiment  could  have  advanced ; 
but  when  they  attempted  it,  the  fire  of  the  English  garri- 
son was  too  hot  for  them.  Every  attempt,  either  to  scale 
the  walls  or  to  pour  through  the  breach,  had  to  be  given 
up.  On  August  1 8  there  was  another  assault,  and  again  on 
September  5.  The  Sepoys'  loss  that  day  must  have  been 
very  heavy,  the  ground  all  round  the  English  position 
being  strewed  with  their  corpses. 

In  addition  to  the  usual  cares  of  war,  the  little  garrison 
was  kept  at  hard  labor  countermining  the  mines  of  the 
enemy.  They  experienced  the  extremes  of  wet  and  heat 
during  this  summer  siege,  with  very  little  shelter  either 
from  rain  or  sun.  Besides  this,  they  were  harassed  and 
kept  on  the  qui  vive  by  constant  false  alarms  from  the 
enemy. 

"  I  feel,"  says  General  Inglis,  "  that  any  words  of  mine  would 
fail  to  convey  any  idea  of  what  our  fatigue  and  labors  have 
been,  —  labors  in  which  all  ranks  and  all  classes  (civilians,  offi- 


3OO    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

cers,  and  soldiers)  have  all  borne  an  equally  noble  part.  All 
have  together  descended  into  the  mines,  all  have  together 
handled  the  shovel  for  the  interment  of  the  putrid  bullocks, 
and  all,  accoutred  with  musket  and  bayonet,  have  relieved  each 
other  on  sentry,  without  regard  to  the  distinctions  of  rank,  civil 
or  military ;  and  the  enemy,  notwithstanding  their  overwhelm- 
ing numbers  and  their  incessant  fire,  could  never  succeed  in 
gaining  one  inch  of  ground  within  the  bounds  of  the  Residency, 
which  was  so  feebly  fortified  that  had  they  once  obtained  a 
footing  in  any  of  the  outposts,  the  whole  place  must  inevitably 
have  fallen.  During  the  early  part  of  these  vicissitudes  we 
were  left  without  any  information  of  the  posture  of  affairs  with- 
out. On  the  twentieth  day  of  the  siege,  however,  a  pensioner 
named  Asgad  brought  in  a  letter  from  General  Havelock's 
camp,  informing  us  that  they  were  advancing  with  sufficient 
force  to  bear  down  all  opposition,  and  would  be  with  us  in  five 
or  six  days.  A  messenger  was  immediately  despatched,  re- 
questing that  on  their  arrival  on  the  outskirts  of  the  city  two 
rockets  might  be  sent  up,  in  order  that  we  might  take  the  neces- 
sary measures  for  assisting  them  to  force  their  way  in.  The 
sixth  day,  however,  expired,  and  they  came  not;  but  for  many 
evenings  after,  officers  and  men  watched  for  the  ascension  of 
the  expected  rockets  with  hopes  such  as  make  the  heart  sick. 
We  knew  not  then  —  nor  did  we  learn  till  August  29,  thirty-five 
days  later  —  that  the  relieving  force,  after  leaving  Cawnpore, 
fought  most  nobly  to  effect  our  deliverance,  but  had  been 
obliged  to  fall  back  for  reinforcements  ;  and  this  was  our  last 
communication  before  the  arrival  of  help,  on  the  2jth  of 
September." 

He  goes  on  to  speak  of  the  heavy  duties  that  fell  on  the 
European  ladies,  —  deprived  of  servants,  attending  on  all 
the  sick,  and  on  their  children,  the  mortality  among  whom 
was  great. 

Dr.  Brydon,  the  sole  survivor  of  the  Cabul  massacre, 
was  at  Lucknow  during  these  terrible  days  of  hard  fighting 
and  uncertainty.  He  was  subsequently  highly  commended 
by  the  Government  in  their  despatches,  for  his  self-devotion 
and  efficiency.  The  General  also  says  :  — 

"  With  respect  to  the  Native  troops  among  us,  I  am  of  opinion 
that  their  loyalty  never  was  surpassed.  They  were  indifferently 
fed  and  worse  housed,  and  were  exposed,  especially  the  Thir- 


THE   INDIAN  MUTINY.  30! 

teenth  Regiment,  to  a  most  galling  fire  of  shot  and  shell.  Every 
effort  —  persuasion,  promise,  and  threat  —  was  used  to  make 
them  desert  us  ;  and  in  all  probability  we  should  have  been 
sacrificed  by  their  desertion.  Sir  James  Outram  has  promised 
to  promote  them.  Our  artillerymen  were  at  the  last  so  reduced 
that  they  had  to  run  from  one  battery  to  another  to  fight  their 
guns.  Towards  the  last  we  had  only  twenty-four  European 
gunners,  and  no  less  than  thirty  guns  in  position." 

"  But  ever  upon  the  topmost  roof  the  banner  of  England  blew  !  " 

I  have  in  the  General's  own  words  given  the  "  plain, 
unvarnished  tale  "  of  the  defence  of  Lucknow  till  the  ar- 
rival of  Havelock  and  Outram  on  September  25.  I  have 
given  no  pathetic  incidents  of  the  siege.  I  have  followed 
the  official  report  of  the  commanding  General  to  his  Gov- 
ernment in  his  own  words ;  and  yet  how  pathetic  is  that 
picture  of  officers  and  men  night  after  night,  for  five-and- 
thirty  nights,  looking  out  for  the  signal  rockets  that  never 
came  ! 

When  General  Havelock  had  communicated  his  taking 
of  Cawnpore,  July  16,  to  the  Government  at  Calcutta,  Gene- 
ral Neill  was  at  once  despatched  to  him  as  second  in  com- 
mand, and  to  take  his  place  in  the  event  of  any  casualty. 
He  arrived  July  24,  and  Havelock  was  eager  the  next  day 
to  cross  the  Ganges,  leaving  Neill  in  command  at  Cawn- 
pore, with  two  hundred  men.  The  force  under  Havelock 
was  about  fifteen  hundred.  The  Ganges  was  swollen,  and 
very  hard  to  cross.  It  took  them  four  days  to  get  over  it. 
In  a  week  Havelock  and  his  little  band  had  fought  and  won 
two  battles ;  but  such  victories  were  destmction  to  the  vic- 
tors, especially  as  cholera  was  beginning  to  make  ravages 
among  them.  Havelock  began  to  feel  that  if  he  lost  by  sick- 
ness and  casualty  two  hundred  and  fifty  men  out  of  fifteen 
hundred  every  twenty-four  hours,  he  would,  even  if  success- 
ful, bring  little  relief  to  Lucknow.  He  decided  to  fall  back 
nearer  to  Cawnpore,  and  wait  for  reinforcements. 

General  Neill  was  greatly  disappointed.  He  had  no  wish 
to  send  on  to  Havelock  every  reinforcement  that  might 
reach  him  coming  up  the  river.  He  complained  loudly, 


3O2    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

wrote  Havelock  an  unbecoming  letter,  and  forwarded  his 
own  views  of  the  situation  to  Calcutta. 

More  and  more  difficulties  surrounded  Havelock.  Nana 
Sahib  had  made  new  levies,  and  these  were  swarming  round 
him.  The  Gwalior  contingent  had  revolted  from  Scindia, 
their  chief,  who  was  loyal  to  the  English ;  and  on  August 
13,  Havelock  fell  back  on  the  city  of  Cawnpore.  On  the 
evening  of  August  17,  after  his  return  from  Bithoor,  the 
former  capital  of  Nana  Sahib,  where  he  had  fought  a 
stoutly  contested  battle  and  gained  a  victory,  the  ha- 
rassed General  received  a  Calcutta  newspaper  informing 
him  that  he  was  superseded,  that  his  superior  officer,  Sir 
James  Outram,  was  coming  up  the  river  to  take  the  com- 
mand, and,  with  reinforcements,  push  on  to  Lucknow. 

Outram  is  known  to  history  as  the  Bayard  of  the  East,  — 
the  man  who  had  no  thought  of  self;  who  would  do  justice 
and  love  mercy,  without  fear  of  personal  consequences.  The 
last  service  on  which  he  had  been  employed  was  a  brief  war 
with  Persia,  from  which  he  had  returned  just  in  time  to  take 
command  of  the  expedition  which,  reinforced  by  Havelock's 
men,  was  to  relieve  Lucknow.  With  Lucknow,  Sir  James 
was  thoroughly  acquainted,  having  lived  there  as  Resident 
for  some  time. 

He  accordingly  reached  Cawnpore,  when  his  immediate 
assumption  of  the  command  would  have  cut  off  Havelock's 
hopes  of  being  the  officer  to  bring  succor  to  the  besieged 
garrison  :  humiliating  him  as  a  soldier,  grieving  him  as  a 
man.  Havelock  was  too  good  a  subordinate  to  make  com- 
plaint at  such  a  moment ;  but  the  first  thing  Sir  James  Out- 
ram did  on  his  arrival,,  was  to  issue  a  general  order  to  the 
troops,  saying  that  he  was  not  the  man  to  take  from  such 
an  officer  as  General  Havelock  the  credit  of  an  expedition 
for  which  he  had  labored  and  planned ;  that  he,  therefore, 
though  General  Havelock's  senior  in  military  rank,  would 
leave  him  the  command  of  the  little  army,  and  accompany 
it  only  as  civil  commissioner,  till  Lucknow  was  relieved^ 
when  he  would  resume  his  authority. 

By  all  military  men  this  is  considered  one  of  the  most 


7 AMES    OUTRAM. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  303 

generous  deeds  ever  done  by  one  soldier  to  another.  As 
such,  it  is  spoken  of  by  Lord  Canning  in  an  official  paper, 
and  it  was  depicted  in  the  centre  of  a  silver  shield  presented 
by  the  inhabitants  of  Bombay  to  Sir  James  Outram,  as  being 
the  crowning  glory  of  his  noble  life  of  service  and  honor. 

The  united  force,  therefore,  pushed  on  through  dangers 
and  difficulties  innumerable  till  it  came  within  striking 
distance  of  Lucknow,  and  made  its  way  into  the  Residency. 

But,  alas  !  it  was  as  a  relief  it  came,  and  not  as  a  deliver- 
ance. It  had  no  means  of  transport  to  convey  away  the 
women  and  children,  the  sick  and  the  wounded ;  and 
even  if  it  had  had  the  means,  it  was  not  strong  enough 
to  convey  them  through  hosts  of  enemies.  All  it  could 
do  was  to  join  them,  to  enable  them  to  hold  out,  to  share 
the  labors  of  the  defence  with  them,  and  wait  for  better 
times.  Happily  there  were  plenty  of  provisions  in  the 
Residency.  Sir  James  Outram  took  possession  of  some 
mosques  and  buildings  outside  the  Residency  limits  and 
fortified  them  till  they  strengthened  his  position.  Thus 
they  remained,  from  September  till  November,  anxiously 
hoping  for  more  relief,  but  far  better  off  than  they  had 
been  before  Outram  and  Havelock  reached  them. 

Meantime,  in  September,  Sir  Colin  Campbell,  the  High- 
land hero  of  the  Crimean  war,  had  reached  Calcutta,  and 
troops  began  to  pour  in,  —  from  the  Mauritius,  from  the 
Cape  of  Good  Hope,  from  transports  on  their  way  to 
China,  and,  most  valuable  of  all,  the  sailors  and  gunners 
of  the  Naval  Brigade,  organized  from  the  ships  of  war,  under 
Captain  William  Peel.  "  He  showed  eminently  all  the  qual- 
ities of  an  organizer  and  a  leader  of  men,"  says  one  who 
knew  him  in  India.  "Nothing  he  ever  did  failed."  "The 
greatness  of  our  loss  we  shall  never  know,"  was  said  a  few 
months  later,  when  his  crowning  work  was  done,  and  he 
died  of  smallpox  at  Cawnpore. 

An  English  writer  thus  sums  up  the  situation  in  India 
when  Sir  Colin  Campbell  arrived  to  take  supreme  com- 
mand of  the  English  forces,  in  September,  1 85  7,  before  the 
fall  of  Delhi :  - 


304  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  A  great  empire  seemed  on  the  point  of  being  lost.  The 
Sepoy  army,  well  organized,  well  disciplined,  and  well  provided, 
had  broken  into  revolt.  The  whole  of  Northern,  Central,  and 
Western  India  seemed  about  to  be  lost.  Nothing  but  Sir  John 
Lawrence's  energy  in  the  Punjaub  saved  India.  But  for  him, 
the  war  would  soon  have  raged  around  Calcutta." 

At  the  time  Sir  Colin  landed  as  general-in-chief,  Cal- 
cutta and  the  Government  were  entirely  cut  off  from 
Delhi  and  the  Punjaub.  Before  Delhi,  a  small  English 
force  was  confronting  a  fortified  city  defended  by  a  large 
army  of  revolted  Sepoys ;  a  small  garrison,  with  women  and 
children  and  ecclesiastics,  was  shut  up  in  the  citadel  at 
Agra ;  a  similar  garrison  was  imprisoned  in  the  Residency 
at  Lucknow.  Besides  this,  it  is  necessary  to  consider  the 
extraordinary  difficulties  Sir  Colin  Campbell  had  to  over- 
come on  the  march  from  Calcutta,  before  we  can  fully 
estimate  his  last  triumphant  campaign. 

From  Calcutta  to  Allahabad,  on  the  Ganges,  is  809  miles 
by  water,  503  by  land.  From  Calcutta  for  120  miles  there 
was  a  railroad ;  but  from  its  terminus  at  Raneegunge  there 
were  nearly  four  hundred  miles  to  be  travelled  on  foot  or  in 
bullock-carts  to  reach  Allahabad.  To  reach  Allahabad  by 
steamer  up  the  Ganges  was  at  any  time  slow  work,  and  now 
all  along  the  river  were  parties  of  the  enemy  ready  to  fire 
on  any  steamer.  From  Allahabad  to  Cawnpore  is  about 
eighty  miles.  At  Cawnpore  the  bridge  of  boats  across  the 
Ganges  was  a  thousand  feet  in  length,  and  from  Cawnpore 
to  Lucknow  is  fifty  miles. 

Every  kind  of  supply  for  the  army  on  its  march  had  to 
be  brought  from  Calcutta,  —  tents,  guns,  clothing,  ammu- 
nition, flour;  for  all  that  the  English  had  previously  pos- 
sessed along  the  route  had  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the 
enemy. 

Sir  Colin  brought  his  troops  to  Raneegunge  by  train,  then 
he  put  them  into  bullock-carts,  with  relays  of  bullocks 
already  stationed  along  the  route,  and  carried  them  onward, 
travelling  by  night  and  resting  by  day.  In  this  way  they 
arrived  at  Allahabad  fresh,  and  ready  for  service.  The 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  305 

little  army  (never  over  four  thousand  strong)  was  composed 
of  scraps  and  remnants  of  corps.  In  it  were  some  High- 
landers devoted  to  Sir  Colin,  and  some  Sikhs  and  Punjau- 
bees  sent  down  from  Delhi.  But  from  Delhi  had  come 
also  a  great  accession  to  the  rebel  forces  round  Cawnpore ; 
viz.,  the  Gwalior  contingent,  the  native  troops  of  the  great 
chief  Scindia,  who  had  had  great  difficulty  in  keeping  them 
from  declaring  against  the  English  some  time  before.  When 
Scindia  heard  of  the  fall  of  Delhi,  however,  he  expressed 
such  satisfaction  that  his  troops  could  be  restrained  from 
mutiny  no  longer,  and,  declaring  that  they  must  find  a 
leader  who  would  conduct  them  against  the  English,  they 
marched  off  to  join  Nana  Sahib. 

This  formidable  body  when  Sir  Colin  reached  Cawn- 
pore was  threatening  the  city,  and  military  precedent  would 
have  demanded  that  he  should  first  dispose  of  them,  and, 
leaving  his  rear  safe,  should  then  have  marched  on  Luck- 
now.  But  advices  from  Sir  James  Outram  reached  him, 
pressing  his  arrival.  He  feared  lest  the  provisions  of  the 
little  garrison  at  Lucknow  might  not  hold  out ;  and,  leaving 
a  small  force  at  Cawnpore  under  General  Windham,  to- 
gether with  the  baggage  of  hir,  army  and  stores  of  all  kinds 
brought  for  the  comfort  of  the  rescued  women  and  children, 
he  pressed  on  to  Lucknow. 

The  siege  of  Lucknow  may  be  said  to  have  consisted  of 
four  acts.  The  first,  when  Sir  Henry  Lawrence  shut  himself 
up,  in  May,  with  his  little  party  in  the  Residency ;  the  sec- 
ond, the  siege  and  defence  that  continued  after  Sir  Henry's 
death  to  the  arrival  of  Havelock,  from  July  to  September ; 
thirdly,  the  siege  till  Sir  Colin  Campbell  arrived  and  car- 
ried off  the  women  and  children ;  and,  lastly,  the  return 
of  Sir  Colin's  army,  the  capture  of  Lucknow,  and  the  utter 
discomfiture  of  the  rebels. 

We  are  now  considering  the  story  of  the  third  act,  which 
ends  with  the  rescue  of  the  garrison  out  of  the  besieged 
Residency. 

When  Outram  and  Havelock  became  aware  that  Sir  Colin 
had  reached  the  Alumbaugh,  a  fortified  palace  less  than 

20 


306  ENGLAND  IN  THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

three  miles  from  Lucknow,  it  became  very  desirable  to 
open  communication  with  him.  They  had  an  old  copy  of 
the  "  Penny  Cyclopaedia "  in  the  Residency,  and  from  it 
learned  the  code  of  signals  used  in  telegraphing  before  the 
days  of  the  electric  telegraph,  by  the  wooden  arms  of  the 
old  semaphores.  They  contrived  to  construct  one,  and  it 
worked  to  their  satisfaction ;  but  still  it  seemed  above  all 
things  desirable  to  send  one  of  their  number  to  Sir  Colin. 
But  to  ask  any  man  to  dare  the  risk  of  passing  through  the 
Sepoy  hordes  was  impossible. 

A  clerk  in  one  of  the  civil  offices,  named  Thomas  Henry 
Kavanagh,  offered  himself. 

"  He  was  very  tall  and  very  fair,  —  a  most  difficult  man  to  dis- 
guise, which  Sir  James  Outram  represented  to  him;  but  Kava- 
nagh had  made  up  his  mind,  and  willingly  offered  himself.  He 
chose  the  garb  of  a  native  Badmash,  —  a  sort  of  bushwhacker,  a 
soldier  who  served  for  plunder.  There  were  many  of  these  in 
the  ranks  of  the  rebels.  He  put  on  a  pair  of  tight  silk  trousers, 
fitting  closely  to  the  skin,  a  tight-fitting  muslin  shirt,  and  a 
short  jacket  of  yellow  silk.  Round  him  he  bound  a  white 
waistband;  over  his  shoulders  he  threw  a  colored  chintz  cloth; 
on  his  head  was  a  cream-colored  turban ;  his  feet  he  inserted 
into  the  slipper-like  shoes  much  worn  by  the  natives  of  India. 
His  face  and  hands  he  dyed  with  oils  and  lampblack,  and  he 
cut  short  his  hair.  He  carried  only  the  sword  and  buckler 
proper  to  his  character." 

After  all  kinds  of  adventures,  which  he  afterwards  detailed 
in  a  small  book,1  he  reached  Sir  Colin  Campbell.  The  morn- 
ing after  he  got  into  camp,  Sir  Colin  inspected  his  men. 

"  The  scene,"  says  one  who  was  present,  "  was  very  striking, 
as  the  little  army  was  drawn  up  in  the  midst  of  an  immense 
plain  ;  it  seemed  a  mere  handful.  The  guns  and  battalions 
that  had  come  down  from  Delhi  looked  blackened  and  service- 
worn  ;  but  the  horses  were  in  good  condition,  the  harness  in 
perfect  repair,  the  men  swarthy,  and  evidently  in  good  fighting 
trim.  The  Ninth  Lancers,  with  their  blue  uniforms  and  white 
turbans  twisted  round  their  forage-caps,  their  flagless  lances, 
lean  but  hardy  horses,  and  gallant  bearing,  looked  the  perfection 

1  Now  not  to  be  obtained. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY,       •  307 

of  a  cavalry  regiment  on  active  service.  Wild  and  bold  was  the 
carriage  of  the  Sikh  cavalry,  riding  untamed-looking  steeds, 
clad  in  loose  fawn-colored  robes,  with  long  boots,  blue  or  red 
turbans  and  sashes,  and  armed  with  carbine  and  sabre.  Next 
to  them  were  the  wasted  remains  of  the  Eighth  and  Seventy- 
fifth,  clad  entirely  in  slate-colored  cloth.  With  a  wearied  air, 
they  stood  grouped  around  their  standards,  —  war  stripped  of 
its  display,  in  all  its  nakedness.  Then  the  Second  and  Fourth 
Punjaub  Infantry,  tall  of  stature,  with  eagle  eyes,  overhung  by 
large  twisted  turbans,  clad  in  short  sand-colored  tunics,  men 
swift  to  march  and  forward  in  the  fight,  ambitious  both  of  glory 
and  of  loot.  Last  stood,  many  in  number,  in  tall  and  serried 
ranks,  the  Ninety-third  Highlanders.  A  waving  sea  of  plumes 
and  tartans  they  looked  as  with  loud  and  rapturous  cheers  they 
welcomed  their  commander.  You  saw  at  once  that  under  him 
they  would  go  anywhere,  do  anything." 

Sir  Colin's  plan,  after  leaving  all  safe  at  the  Alumbaugh, 
was  to  make  a  flank  march  to  the  west  and  get  possession 
of  a  large  park  called  the  Dilcoosha,  and  the  Martiniere. 
This  plan,  by  means  of  Kavanagh,  had  been  agreed  upon 
between  Sir  Colin  and  Sir  James  Outram. 

The  Alumbaugh  had  been  held  for  six  weeks  by  a  small 
European  garrison  left  in  it  by  Havelock. 

It  would  be  impossible  here  to  describe  the  fight.  I  can 
only  say  the  contest  was  severe,  but  the  plan  was  carried 
out  successfully.  Building  after  building  was  stormed. 
The  Sikhs  and  Highlanders  fought  side  by  side.  At  one 
moment,  when  all  depended  on  the  successful  capture  of  a 
strong  position,  Sir  Colin  gathered  his  own  Highlanders 
about  him,  and  simply  told  them  that  the  thing  must  be 
done  ;  he  had  intended  to  spare  them  for  the  remainder 
of  the  day,  but  this  thing  must  be  accomplished.  He 
himself  would  lead  them. 

Yet  again  and  again  the  attack  seemed  to  fail.  Sud- 
denly a  sergeant  communicated  to  his  colonel  that  he  had 
fancied  he  perceived  a  breach  in  the  wall  of  the  enclosure. 
The  colonel  and  a  few  men  crept  round  through  the  brush- 
wood to  reconnoitre.  They  mounted  the  breach  unop- 
posed ;  they  pushed  on  to  the  gate,  and  opened  it  to  theii 


308   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

comrades.  The  garrison  had  given  up  the  place.  The  vic- 
tory was  won.  Soon  Havelock  and  Outram  came  riding 
through  a  storm  of  bullets  to  join  Sir  Colin.  It  was  agreed 
that  the  relieving  army  should  form,  as  it  were,  two  lines, 
leaving  a  passage  through  narrow  lanes  out  of  the  Residency. 
Through  this  passage  the  women  and  children  passed  first 
into  Sir  Colin's  camp  on  the  night  of  November  25,  1857. 
Then  came  the  sick  and  wounded.  The  garrison  followed 
the  next  night.  The  rebel  Sepoys  were  wholly  unconscious 
of  the  evacuation  of  the  Residency,  and  continued  to  fire  on 
it  long  after  not  a  soul  was  there.  The  treasure  was  brought 
away  in  safety ;  the  guns  were  spiked.  Not  much  ammu- 
nition or  food  remained  to  be  left  behind. 

One  sad  event  occurred  to  cast  a  gloom  over  this  tri- 
umph. Worn  out  with  toil  and  anxiety,  Sir  Henry  Have- 
lock  died  a  few  hours  after  reaching  the  Alumbaugh. 

He  was  born  in  the  English  Dane-laugh,  and  traced  his 
name,  Havelock,  back  to  an  old  Norse  king  converted  by 
Alfred.  Very  early  in  life  he  became  an  earnest  Christian, 
and  eventually  (though  his  family  belonged  to  the  Church 
of  England)  he  joined  the  Baptists,  having  been  brought  to 
deep  religious  conviction  by  a  missionary  on  board  the  ship 
that  carried  him  to  India. 

The  glory  of  his  life  came  to  him  after  he  was  sixty 
years  old;  but  he  had  been  preparing  himself  for  it 
forty  years,  by  study,  training,  self-discipline,  and  faith- 
ful service.  His  statue  stands  now  beside  Nelson's,  in 
Trafalgar  Square,  as  a  man  whom  the  English  nation 
delights  to  honor. 

All  he  had  suffered  during  his  imprisonment  in  the 
Residency  had  told  upon  him.  He  died  of  dysentery.  A 
short  time  before  his  death,  he  heard  of  his  having  been 
made  Sir  Henry  Havelock;  and  greater  honors  were  in 
store  for  him,  of  which  he  did  not  live  to  hear.  His 
death-bed  was  all  peace,  though  war  was  raging  round 
him.  They  buried  him  beneath  the  scorching  Indian 
sky,  hard  by  the  vast  city,  the  scene  alike  of  his  toil,  his 
triumph,  and  his  death. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  309 

The  Queen  had  promoted  him  to  be  a  major-general  and 
a  baronet.  The  baronetcy  descended  to  his  gallant  son 
and  aide-de-camp,  together  with  a  life-pension,  granted  by 
Parliament,  which  enables  him  to  keep  up  the  dignity. 

But  the  army  of  Sir  Colin  Campbell  had  to  turn  their 
backs  as  speedily  as  possible  on  the  grave  of  Havelock  and 
the  city  of  Lucknow.  General  Windham  at  Cawnpore  had 
been  attacked  by  the  troops  of  Nana  Sahib,  reinforced  by 
the  Gwalior  contingent,  and  was  in  the  utmost  peril,  together 
with  the  bridge  of  boats  by  which  alone  Sir  Colin's  army 
could  recross  the  Ganges. 

All  day,  on  the  28th  of  November,  the  British  force  in 
Cawnpore  had  fought  desperately,  but  hopelessly,  and  at 
night  it  was  compelled  to  fall  back  into  intrenchments 
wholly  inadequate  to  give  it  shelter. 

"The  dust  of  no  succoring  column  could  be  seen  rising  from 
the  plains  of  Oude ;  and  the  sullen  plunge  of  the  rebel  round- 
shot  into  the  river  showed  how  frail  was  the  link,  how  en- 
dangered was  the  bridge  of  boats,  that  bound  us  to  the  shore 
of  Oude,  whence  only  succor  could  come.  The  clatter  of  a  few 
horsemen  was  suddenly  heard  passing  over  the  bridge,  and 
ascending  to  the  Fort  at  a  rapid  pace.  As  they  came  close 
under  the  ramparts,  an  old  man  with  gray  hair  was  seen  rid- 
ing at  their  head.  One  of  the  soldiers  recognized  Sir  Colin 
Campbell.  The  news  spread  like  wild  fire.  The  men  crowd- 
ing upon  the  parapet  sent  forth  cheer  after  cheer.  The  Sepoys, 
surprised  at  the  commotion,  for  a  few  minutes  ceased  their  fire. 
The  old  man  rode  in  through  the  gate.  All  felt  then  that  the 
crisis  was  over,  —  that  the  Residency  at  Lucknow  saved,  would 
not  now  be  balanced  by  Cawnpore  lost." 

When  the  morning  broke,  the  plain  towards  Lucknow 
was  white  with  the  tents  of  the  returning  army.  The 
British  artillery  silenced  the  guns  that  played  upon  the 
bridge,  and  the  army  commenced  its  passage.  Then 
the  rebel  troops  evacuated  Cawnpore,  burning  up,  as  they 
did  so,  before  the  eyes  of  the  English,  all  the  baggage  left 
behind  to  facilitate  a  rapid  march  to  and  from  Lucknow, 
and  all  the  stores  collected  for  the  comfort  of  the  destitute 


3IO  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

women  and  children.  The  passage  of  the  bridge  was 
a  long  and  very  anxious  one.  The  column  of  women 
and  children,  sick,  wounded,  and  treasure  that  Sir  Colin 
Campbell's  army  escorted,  reached  more  than  two  miles, 
and  then,  to  be  in  safety,  all  had  to  be  escorted  to 
Allahabad. 

The  moment  they  were  out  of  the  way,  Sir  Colin  began 
his  work  of  punishing  the  Gwalior  contingent,  ten  thousand 
strong,  and  supplied  with  all  the  material  of  war.  He  came 
down  on  their  camp  by  a  great  detour  to  the  west,  while  a 
feigned  attack  on  their  left  and  centre  kept  them  from  per- 
ceiving what  was  going  on.  The  Gwalior  soldiers  were 
utterly  routed  ;  their  camp  was  taken,  and  all  their  guns. 
The  English  cavalry  pursued  them  fourteen  miles  along  the 
high-road.  Not  a  gun,  not  a  tumbril,  not  a  bullock-cart 
escaped.  The  fugitives,  throwing  away  their  arms  and 
accoutrements,  at  last  dispersed  over  the  country,  hiding  in 
the  jungle  and  the  grain  from  the  red  sabres  and  lances  of 
the  horsemen.  When  the  pursuers,  late  in  the  evening, 
reined  in  their  weary  horses  by  the  fourteenth  milestone, 
there  was  not  an  enemy  in  their  front. 

And  now,  Cawnpore  relieved  from  the  enemy,  Sir 
Colin  and  his  little  army  resumed  the  re-conquest  of  Oude 
and  the  final  punishment  of  Lucknow.  Troops  came  from 
Bombay  and  Madras  that  cleared  the  rebels  out  in  Central 
India  and  drove  them  into  the  Hills. 

The  reason  that  Sepoys  from  the  Presidencies  of  Madras 
and  Bombay  were  more  faithful  than  those  of  Bengal  was 
that  they  were  lower-caste  men.  The  ladies  and  children 
from  Agra  reached  Cawnpore  in  safety  about  three  months 
after  the  rescue  of  those  at  Lucknow ;  and  then  Sir  Colin, 
collecting  such  a  force  as  India  had  never  before  seen 
under  a  British  general,  marched  into  Oude  and  advanced 
on  Lucknow. 

"  Having  marched  the  last  day  through  miles  of  barren  and 
uninteresting  country,"  writes  an  officer  of  Fusileers,  "  we  came 
in  sight  of  the  camp  of  the  little  army  of  Sir  James  Outram  at 
Alumbaugh,  which  Sir  Colin  had  left  behind  when  he  marched 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  311 

away  with  his  convoy  from  Lucknow.  There,  within  those  few 
tents,  were  the  gallant  men  who  had  held  the  thousands  of 
Oude  and  the  rebel  Sepoys  in  check  so  long;  yet  who  could 
fancy  it  was  an  army  encamped  before  a  large  city  occupied  by 
a  numerous  enemy  ?  " 

Some  one  has  described  Lucknow  as  the  greenest  city  in 
the  world.  Its  palaces  were  all  surrounded  with  gardens  or 
with  topes,  that  is,  groves  of  trees.  When  the  final  attack 
was  made,  on  the  i5th  of  March,  just  ten  months  after  the 
outbreak  of  the  Mutiny,  the  troops  burst  through  the  Kaiser- 
baugh,  a  palace  larger  than  Versailles,  and  then  advanced 
towards  the  Residency. 

The  enemy  made  no  stand.  Hodson  the  day  before  had 
been  wounded,  and  that  day  he  lay  dying.  Whatever  we 
may  think  of  him  as  a  man  of  honor,  he  was  the  idol  of  the 
troops,  who  felt  that  his  death  made  indeed  an  important 
vacancy. 

Although  a  few  fanatics  remained  in  the  city,  there  was 
no  fighting  to  any  extent  after  the  i  yth  of  March.  A  week 
later,  the  townspeople  were  beginning  to  return  to  their 
homes,  and  civil  authority,  aided  by  a  powerful  police, 
began  once  more  to  rule  the  city  of  Lucknow. 

It  remained  to  reconstruct  the  Government  of  India. 
Poor  John  Company  was  swept  away.  The  Queen  assumed 
sway  as  Empress  of  India,  though  she  did  not  for  many 
years  assume  the  title.  The  Governor-General  became  a 
Viceroy.  Lord  Elgin  was  the  first  Viceroy  after  Lord 
Canning ;  the  next  was  Sir  John  Lawrence,  who  was  raised 
to  the  peerage  in  1869.  The  natives  understood  the  rule 
of  an  Empress  better  than  that  of  a  trading  company. 

The  first  thing  done  by  the  Government  was  to  extend 
railroads  all  over  the  country.  India  has  been  peaceful 
ever  since,  though  half-educated  natives  occasionally  grow 
excited,  as  they  become  acquainted  with  European  history, 
over  the  idea  that  they  are  not  sufficiently  admitted  to  a 
share  in  the  government. 

The  people  have  been,  on  the  whole,  prosperous  and 
well  contented.  Old  superstitions  are  dying  out.  It  is  said 


312   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

that  coolies  are  now  hired  to  drag  the  Juggernaut  car. 
The  number  of  Christian  converts  is  now  great.  The  seed 
sown  by  Henry  Martyn,  Bishop  Heber,  Dr.  William  Carey, 
and  others  is  beginning  to  bring  forth  fruit  an  hundredfold. 
Learned  men  are  also  beginning  to  find  affinities  between 
uncorrupted  Buddhism  and  Christian  thought. 

It  is  not  to  be  denied  that,  with  their  passions  roused 
to  madness  by  reports  —  some  true,  some  false  —  of  the 
atrocities  practised  upon  English  women  and  children, 
fierce  vengeance  was  taken  by  the  English  soldiers.  No 
prisoners  were  made  on  either  side.  Indeed,  the  English 
had  no  force  with  which  they  could  have  guarded  prisoners. 

After  all  was  over,  the  faithful  were  liberally  rewarded, 
and  the  new  Government  set  itself  to  remedy  the  mistakes 
made  in  dealing  with  the  feudal  landowners  of  Oude. 

Lord  Canning  was  long  reviled  by  excited  Anglo-Indians 
as  "Clemency  "  Canning.  The  years  that  have  passed  since 
have  vindicated  his  wisdom  and  right  feeling. 

"  In  that  terrible  time,"  says  a  writer  in  "  All  the  Year  Round," 
"men  like  Lord  Clyde  were  deeply  impressed  by  the  calm 
courage  and  firmness  of  Lord  Canning.  He  was  magnanimous 
too  (a  very  rare  quality),  and  never  attempted,  all  through  the 
storm  of  obloquy  that  beat  on  him,  to  right  himself  by  blaming 
his  countrymen." 

It  is  true  that  he  did  not,  like  Sir  John  Lawrence,  realize 
at  once  that  the  war  of  the  Mutiny  was  to  the  English  a 
struggle  for  existence.  He  was  reluctant  for  some  time  to 
let  a  regiment  of  English  volunteers  be  raised  in  Calcutta. 
He  restricted  the  liberty  of  the  Press,  both  Native  and 
English,  appalled  by  the  ferocity  of  Anglo-Indian  jour- 
nals. He  disarmed  civilian  Englishmen  when  he  disarmed 
Natives;  "and  no  wonder,"  says  an  English  writer,  "when 
'  pandy-potting '  was  looked  upon  by  new  arrivals  in  the 
light  of  an  amusement,  and  when  even  soldiers  of  the  line 
as  they  stepped  off  their  ship  would  fix  bayonets  and  in  the 
Calcutta  streets  prepare  to  hunt  down  '  niggers.'  The  fact 
is,  it  was  a  panic  ;  and  fear  is  always  cruel.  Canning  had 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  313 

the  nerve  to  do  all  he  could  to  prevent  Englishmen  from 
behaving  worse  than  tigers." 

Lord  Canning  survived  his  admirable  wife  only  a  few 
months.  She  died  at  Barrackpore  in  November,  1861 ;  he 
died  the  following  summer  in  England. 

The  Queen  when  she  assumed  the  government  of  India 
issued  a  proclamation  which  was  received  by  her  Indian 
subjects  with  gratitude  and  acclamation.  The  first  draft 
of  this  proclamation  had  not  been  entirely  satisfactory  to 
the  Queen  and  Prince  Albert,  who  returned  it  to  Lord 
Derby,  the  Prime  Minister,  with  the  following  note : — 

"  The  Queen  would  be  glad  if  Lord  Derby  would  write  it 
himself  in  his  excellent  language,  bearing  in  mind  that  it  is  a 
female  sovereign  who  speaks  to  more  than  a  hundred  million  of 
Eastern  people,  on  assuming  the  direct  government  over  them, 
and  after  a  bloody  war,  giving  them  pledges  which  her  future 
reign  is  to  redeem,  and  explaining  the  principles  of  her  govern- 
ment. Such  a  document  should  breathe  feelings  of  generosity, 
benevolence,  and  religious  toleration,  and  point  out  the  privi- 
leges which  the  people  of  India  will  receive  by  being  placed 
on  an  equality  with  other  subjects  of  the  British  Crown,  and 
the  prosperity  following  in  the  train  of  civilization." 

A  noble  proclamation  was  drawn  up,  in  accordance  with 
these  views.  Want  of  space  only  prevents  me  from  quoting 
large  portions  of  so  admirable  a  document. 

"  It  was  received,"  says  Colonel  Malleson,  "  by  all  classes  in 
India  with  the  deepest  enthusiasm.  The  princes  and  land- 
owners especially  regarded  it  as  a  charter  which  would  render 
their  possessions  secure,  and  their  rights  —  more  especially  the 
right  of  adoption  —  absolutely  inviolable.  The  people  in  general 
welcomed  it  as  the  document  which  closed  up  the  wounds  of 
the  Mutiny,  which  declared  in  effect  that  bygones  were  to  be 
bygones,  and  that  thenceforth  there  should  be  one  Queen  and 
one  people.  Many  of  the  rebels  still  in  arms  —  all,  in  fact,  except 
those  absolutely  irreconcilable  —  took  advantage  of  its  provisions 
to  lay  down  their  arms  and  submit  to  its  easy  conditions.  In 
the  great  towns  of  India,  natives  of  every  religion  and  creed, 
the  Mohammedans,  the  Parsees,  met  in  numbers  to  draw  up 
loyal  addresses  expressive  of  their  deep  sense  of  the  beneficent 


314  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

feelings  which  had  prompted  the  proclamation,  of  their  grati- 
tude for  its  contents,  and  of  their  loyalty  to  the  person  of  the 
illustrious  Lady  to  whose  rule  they  had  been  transferred." 

And  thus  ended  a  conflict  which  had  deluged  the  country 
with  blood,  and  thus  was  inaugurated  "  an  era  of  hope  alike 
for  the  loyal  and  the  misguided,  for  the  prince  and  the 
peasant,  for  the  owner  and  for  the  cultivator,  for  every  class 
and  for  every  creed." 

There  is  no  more  heart-stirring  account  of  the  siege 
of  Lucknow  than  Tennyson's  noble  poem.  All  who  may 
read  this  book  doubtless  know  it  well.  But  there  is  an 
American  ballad  on  the  same  subject  which  moves  me 
strangely  every  time  I  read  it.  It  is  by  Robert  Lowell, 
brother  of  James  Russell  Lowell,  and  is  founded  on  the 
story  of  Jessie  Brown,  once  considered  apocryphal,  but  now, 
I  believe,  substantiated. 

THE   RELIEF   OF  LUCKNOW. 

Oh,  that  last  day  in  Lucknow  Fort  ! 

We  knew  that  it  was  the  last  ! 
That  the  enemy's  mines  had  crept  slowly  in, 

And  the  end  was  coming  fast. 

To  yield  to  that  foe  meant  worse  than  death, 
And  the  men  —  and  we  all  —  worked  on  : 

It  was  one  day  more  of  smoke  and  roar, 
And  then  it  would  all  be  done. 

There  was  one  of  us,  a  corporal's  wife, 

A  fair  young  gentle  thing, 
Wasted  with  fever  in  the  siege, 

And  her  mind  was  wandering. 

She  lay  on  the  ground  in  her  Scottish  plaid, 

And  I  took  her  head  on  my  knee. 
"  When  my  father  comes  name  frae  the  pleugh,"  she  said, 

"  Oh,  please  then  waken  me  !  " 

She  slept  like  a  child  on  her  father's  floor, 

In  the  flicking  of  woodbine  shade, 
When  the  house-dog  sprawls  by  the  open  door, 

And  the  mother's  wheel  is  stayed. 


THE  INDIAN  MUTINY.  315 

It  was  smoke  and  roar  and  powder  stench, 

And  hopeless  waiting  for  death  ; 
But  the  soldier's  wife,  like  a  full-tired  child, 

Seemed  scarce  to  draw  her  breath. 

I  sank  to  sleep,  and  I  had  my  dream 

Of  an  English  village  lane, 
And  wall  and  garden,  —  a  sudden  scream 

Brought  me  back  to  the  roar  again. 

There  Jessie  Brown  stood  listening, 

And  then  a  broad  gladness  broke 
All  over  her  face,  and  she  took  my  hand 

And  drew  me  near  and  spoke. 

"The  Hielanders  !  Oh,  dinna  ye  hear 

The  slogan  far  awa  ? 
The  McGregors  ?  —  aye,  I  hear  it  weel ; 

It 's  the  grandest  o'  them  a'. 

"  God  bless  thae  bonny  Hielanders  ! 

We're  saved  !  we're  saved!  "  she  cried, 
And  fell  on  her  knees  ;  and  thanks  to  God 

Poured  forth  like  a  full  flood-tide. 

Along  the  battery-line  her  cry 

Had  fallen  among  the  men, 
And  they  started  ;  for  they  were  there  to  die : 

Was  life  so  near  them,  then  ? 

They  listened  for  life  ;  and  the  rattling  fire 

Far  off,  and  the  far-off  roar 
Were  all ;  and  the  colonel  shook  his  head; 

And  they  turned  to  their  guns  once  more. 

Then  Jessie  said,  "  That  slogan  's  done, 

But  do  ye  no  hear  them  noo  ? 
The  Campbells  are  comin'.     It's  no  a  dream  ; 

Our  succors  have  broken  through  !  " 

We  heard  the  roar  and  the  rattle  afar, 

But  the  pipes  we  could  not  hear  ; 
So  the  men  plied  their  work  of  hopeless  war, 

And  knew  that  the  end  was  near. 

It  was  not  long  ere  it  must  be  heard, 

A  shrilling,  ceaseless  sound  ; 
It  was  no  noise  of  the  strife  afar, 

Or  the  sappers  underground. 


3 1 6,  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

It  "was  the  pipes  of  the  Highlanders  ! 

And  now  they  played  "  Auld  Lang  Syne  !  " 
It  came  to  our  men  like  the  voice  of  God, 

And  they  shouted  along  the  line. 

And  they  wept,  and  shook  one  another's  hands ; 

And  the  women  sobbed  in  a  crowd  ; 
And  every  one  kneeled  down  where  we  stood, 

And  we  all  thanked  God  aloud  ! 

That  happy  day  when  we  welcomed  them 

The  men  put  Jessie  first, 
And  the  General  took  her  hand,  —  and  cheers 

From  the  men  like  a  volley  burst. 

And  the  pipers'  ribbons  and  tartans  streamed, 
Marching  round  and  round  our  line, 

And  our  joyful  cheers  were  broken  by  tears, 
For  the  pipes  played  "  Auld  Lang  Syne  "  ! 


CHAPTER  XII. 

DEATH   OF  THE   PRINCE   CONSORT. 

/~PHE  interesting  points  in  English  history  during  the 
•*•  years  that  immediately  preceded  the  death  of  Prince 
Albert  (made  Prince  Consort  in  1857  by  an  Order  in  Coun- 
cil) were  all  connected  with  the  politics  of  foreign  nations 
or  with  wars  in  distant  lands.  If  we  read  the  Life  of  the 
Prince  Consort,  in  five  volumes,  written  by  Sir  Theodore 
Martin,  under  the  superintendence  of  the  Queen,  we  shall 
find  that  after  those  great  and  terrible  episodes  in  English 
history,  the  Crimean  war  and  the  Indian  Mutiny,  the 
Prince's  thoughts  were  largely  occupied  with  foreign  diplo- 
macy. He  watched  with  especial  interest  and  not  a  little 
apprehension  the  steps  that  led  to  the  formation  of  the 
kingdom  of  Italy.  The  Emperor  Napoleon  III.,  he  said, 
had  a  mania  for  map-making ;  and  his  evident  intention 
of  destroying  the  provisions  of  the  Treaty  of  Vienna  might, 
he  feared,  disturb  the  balance  of  power  on  the  Continent 
of  Europe,  and  indirectly  affect  England. 

He  did  not  live  to  see  the  unity  of  Germany  under  a 
German  Emperor,  nor  even  the  North  German  Confedera- 
tion, formed  after  the  Seven  Weeks'  War,  in  1866,  which 
ended  in  the  battle  of  Sadowa.  He  did  not  see  all  Italy 
united  into  one  kingdom, — a  change  that  he  appears  to  have 
deprecated.  Up  to  the  moment  of  his  death,  he  did  not  see 
how  the  Pope,  as  a  temporal  prince,  could  be  got  rid  of,  — 
nor,  apparently,  at  that  time  did  the  Emperor  Napoleon,  who 
proposed,  shortly  before  Prince  Albert's  death,  to  offer  His 
Holiness  the  kingdom  of  Sardinia  in  exchange  for  his  sov- 
ereignty in  the  Eternal  City, — a  proposition,  we  may  be  very 
certain,  Pope  Pius  IX.  would  never  have  agreed  to.  From 
the  close  of  the  Crimean  war  to  his  death, — that  is,  for  about 


318   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

six  years, — Prince  Albert  was  always  uneasy  about  the  inten- 
tions of  the  French  Emperor.  He  never  felt  confident  that 
he  would  not  some  day  seek  to  avenge  Waterloo.  He  mani- 
festly did  not  like  him  as  a  man,  and  mistrusted  him  as  a 
politician.  He  did  not  share  his  wife's  personal  attraction 
towards  the  Emperor,  though  she  seems  pleased  to  record 
that  he  admired  the  Empress.  Over  the  Queen,  Louis 
Napoleon  seems  to  have  exercised  that  magnetic  influence 
that  he  had  it  in  his  power  to  employ  sometimes.  Prince 
Albert  greatly  wronged  him  in  believing  that  his  professions 
of  friendship  for  England  were  not  sincere.  The  strongest 
trait  in  Napoleon's  character  was  his  grateful  remembrance 
of  benefits  or  kindness.  He  was  until  some  time  after  the 
Prince  Consort's  death  faithful  to  his  English  alliance,  more 
faithful  than  England  was  to  him  ;  for  all  through  the  his- 
tory of  the  ten  years  that  succeeded  the  Crimean  war  she 
had  a  diplomatic  leaning  towards  Austria. 

Before  I  enter  on  a  life  of  which  the  Princess  Alice  says, 
"  A  married  life  like  my  father's  was  a  whole  long  lifetime, 
though  only  two-and-twenty  years,"  I  will  mention  briefly  a 
few  of  the  events  that  most  interested  the  public  from  the 
close  of  the  last  chapter,  in  1858,  to  the  sad  event  which 
gives  its  name  to  this,  in  1861. 

When  Orsini  exploded  his  bombs  in  the  Rue  Lepelletier 
under  the  carriage  of  the  Emperor  Napoleon,  he  doubtless 
did  not  foresee  that  they  would  do  more  damage  in  England 
than  in  France,  though  there  they  killed  or  wounded  one 
hundred  and  sixty-eight  people.  Orsini  had  made  his 
escape  from  an  Austrian  prison,  and  had  published  a  book 
about  it  which  had  created  much  sympathy  for  him  in  Eng- 
land. He  was  handsome,  in  the  long-haired,  dark-eyed, 
sentimental  style.  He  gave  lectures  in  England,  and  per- 
suaded himself  that  the  interest  he  succeeded  in  exciting 
for  himself  extended  to  the  cause  in  which  he  was  engaged. 
He  remained  in  England  over  a  year,  feted  as  a  sort  of 
popular  hero ;  then  he  went  over  to  Paris,  calling  himself 
Mr.  Alsop,  leaving  a  scientific  man,  Dr.  Simon  Barnard,  in 
London,  to  make  his  bombs. 


DEATH  OF   THE  PRINCE   CONSORT.  319 

After  the  explosion,  when  the  police  began  inquiries 
into  the  antecedents  of  Orsini,  it  was  discovered  he  had 
many  friends  in  England,  and  it  was  at  once  assumed  in 
France  that  England  encouraged  the  assassination  of  un- 
popular sovereigns,  and  offered  a  safe  asylum  to  murderous 
plotters. 

We  all  know  that  in  England  or  America  no  foreigner 
simply  accused  of  political  crime  can  be  surrendered  to  his 
Government ;  but  in  France,  where  the  police  can  march 
any  suspicious  person  over  the  frontier,  this  state  of  things 
in  England  was  not  understood.  If  the  state  neither  pun- 
ished nor  prevented  such  attempts  at  regicide,  it  was,  the 
French  argued,  because  the  English  people  were  glad  to 
connive  at  having  a  French  Emperor  assassinated. 

Addresses  were  sent  up  to  the  Emperor  and  Empress 
from  every  part  of  France,  especially  from  the  army.  One 
regiment  declared  that  it  longed  to  demand  an  account 
from  the  nation  it  described  as  "  that  land  of  impunity,  which 
contains  the  haunts  of  monsters  who  are  sheltered  by  its 
laws."  The  soldiers  implored  the  Emperor  to  give  them 
his  orders,  and  they  "would  pursue  them  even  to  their 
strongholds."  In  another  address  it  was  urged  that  that 
repaire  infdme  (den  of  infamy),  London,  to  wit,  "where 
plots  so  infernal  were  permitted  to  be  hatched,  should  be 
destroyed  forever." 

Unfortunately,  these  intemperate  expressions  of  rage  were 
inserted  in  the  "  Moniteur,"  where  nothing,  it  is  supposed,  is 
published  but  what  is  approved  by  the  Government.  By  this 
means  the  English  people  were  quite  as  much  roused  against 
the  French  as  the  French  against  the  English.  Indeed,  this 
matter  broke  up,  not  only  friendliness  between  the  two 
nations,  but  the  cordial  relations  between  the  royal  and  im- 
perial families.  Queen  Victoria  and  the  Emperor  Napoleon 
were  never  the  same  to  each  other  from  that  day  forward. 
Nor  was  this  all :  Dr.  Barnard  was  arrested,  —  "a  thin, 
worn  man,  with  dark,  restless  eyes,  a  sallow  complexion,  a 
thick  moustache,  and  a  profusion  of  long  black  hair  combed 
backward,  and  reaching  nearly  to  his  shoulders,  exposing  a 


32O  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

low,  but  broad  and  retreating,  forehead."  He  was  tried 
upon  some  trivial  charge  which  brought  him  within  the 
grasp  of  the  law  of  England ;  but  he  was  triumphantly 
acquitted,  English  sentiment  insisting  that  no  man  should 
be  tried  in  England  and  found  guilty  at  the  bidding  of  any 
foreign  monarch.  "The  public  mind  upon  this  point,"  says 
Justin  McCarthy,  "  was  analogous  to  that  of  old  General 
Jackson,  who,  on  one  occasion,  came  near  refusing,  with  one 
of  his  bursts  of  wrath,  a  perfectly  reasonable,  and  courteous, 
request,  from  the  French  Government,  because  his  secretary, 
on  translating  the  despatch  which  began, '  Le  gouvernement 
Francais  demande,'  gave  the  words,  "  The  French  Govern- 
ment demands.'  With  his  usual  shower  of  eccentric  oaths, 
old  Jackson  burst  out  with  the  declaration  that  if  the  French 
Government  dared  to  demand  anything  from  the  United 
States,  they  should  not  get  it !  And  it  took  a  good  while  to 
make  him  understand  that  demander  in  French  by  no  means 
meant  demand." 

Lord  Palmerston,  who  had  been  made  Prime  Minister  at 
the  height  of  the  Crimean  war,  had  introduced  a  very  mild 
and  apparently  reasonable  measure  into  Parliament  to  com- 
pel foreigners  engaged  in  plotting  against  the  lives  of  foreign 
sovereigns  to  leave  the  country.  But  the  bill  was  thrown 
out  by  an  enormous  majority ;  and  Dr.  Barnard  remained 
unpunished,  to  furnish  more  bombs  to  conspirators,  if  he 
thought  proper,  in  security.  But  Lord  Palmerston  was 
thrown  out  of  office ;  the  ministry  that  had  brought  the 
Crimean  war  to  a  close,  and  had  dealt  triumphantly  with 
the  Indian  Mutiny,  lost  the  confidence  of  the  country. 
Twice  had  Lord  Palmerston's  friendship  for  Louis  Napoleon 
lost  him  his  official  position.  A  Tory  ministry,  under  Lord 
Derby  and  Mr.  Disraeli,  came  into  office  for  sixteen  months. 
But  on  the  point  of  right  of  asylum  for  political  offenders 
the  English  are  very  sensitive.  "  When  Lord  Palmerston 
had  been  accused  of  arrogance  abroad,  he  had  been  '  dear 
old  Pam '  to  the  normal  Englishman ;  but  when  he  was 
foolishly  conceived  to  have  unduly  yielded  an  inch  to  France, 
there  came  instantly  to  his  opponents  the  opportunity  of 


DEATH  OF   THE   PRINCE   CONSORT.  321 

turning  him  out  of  office,  —  which  his  opponents  were  not 
slow  to  do." 

Prince  Albert,  writing  to  Baron  Stockmar  at  this  time, 
says: 

"  Here  we  are  in  the  middle  of  a  ministerial  crisis  and  of  a 
bad  state  of  matters  in  politics.  Lord  Palmerston,  who  only  two 
days  ago  had  a  majority,  has  been  hit  upon  the  French  question. 
For  this  we  have  to  thank  the  heedlessness  of  Louis  Napoleon, 
who  ought  to  have  known  better  than  to  suffer  England  to  be 
insulted  by  his  colonels.  The  excitement  in  this  country  is 
tremendous,  and  at  this  moment  Lord  Palmerston  is  the  most 
unpopular  of  men.  It  is  quite  ludicrous  to  hear  his  old  wor- 
shippers talk  of  him.  In  the  Lower  House  they  would  scarcely 
let  him  open  his  mouth,  but  regularly  hooted  him  down.  .  .  . 
Twenty  thousand  people  assembled  in  Hyde  Park  yesterday, 
with  the  cry,  '  Down  with  the  French  ! '  When  this  excitement 
has  passed  off,  reason  will  assert  itself." 

By  degrees  feeling  subsided,  both  in  France  and  England, 
as  to  the  Conspiracy  Bill ;  and  the  Emperor  endeavored  to 
"  make  up  "  by  sending  Marshal  Pelissier,  Duke  of  Malakoff, 
as  ambassador  to  England,  to  replace  Persigny,  who  had 
proved  himself  too  fiery.  But  there  was  for  some  time  talk 
of  a  possible  French  invasion,  for  which  the  country  ought 
to  be  prepared.  Volunteer  companies  were  organized  all 
over  England,  and  there  was  much  drilling,  amateur  soldier- 
ing, and  military  enthusiasm.  The  Volunteer  system  has 
been  kept  up  and  improved  until  the  present  day,  and  now 
forms  an  efficient  army  of  two  hundred  and  nineteen  thou- 
sand men. 

The  other  little  episode  —  of  which  I  should  like  to  give 
a  more  extended  account  than  is  here  permitted  —  concerns 
the  restoration  of  the  "  Resolute  "  to  Her  Majesty  by  the 
President  of  the  United  States  in  the  summer  of  1856. 

Sir  John  Franklin  sailed  on  his  last  expedition  in  search  of 
the  Northwest  Passage  in  the  spring  of  1845.  By  1849,  ex' 
peditions  were  being  fitted  out  in  search  of  him.  In  1852, 
Sir  Edward  Belcher,  an  experienced  Arctic  navigator,  sailed 
with  four  ships,  —  the  "  Resolute,"  "  Intrepid,"  "  Pioneer," 

21 


322   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

and  "  Assistance."  The  same  year,  Captain  McClure  in 
the  "  Investigator  "  entered  the  Arctic  seas  by  Behring's 
Straits.  Both  parties  were  frozen  up  in  the  ice  in  the  winter 
of  1853-54,  within  fifty  miles  of  each  other,  and  remained 
so  all  winter,  until  in  the  spring  a  party  from  the  "  Investi- 
gator," hunting  on  the  ice,  was  amazed  to  see  men  in  the 
distance,  who  proved  to  be  their  countrymen  from  Sir 
Edward  Belcher's  ships.  Thus  by  walking  over  the  ice  for 
fifty  miles  was  made  the  Northwest  Passage.  But  it  was 
decided  to  abandon  the  ships  frozen  fast  in  the  ice,  and 
both  parties  made  their  way  to  Beechy  Island.  The  "  Reso- 
lute "  was  swept  clean,  left  in  good  order,  and  her  men 
sadly  deserted  her  in  September,  1854. 

In  April,  1855,  an  American  whaler,  in  latitude  67°  (a 
thousand  miles  from  where  the  "  Resolute  "  had  been  for- 
saken by  her  crew),  came  in  sight  of  an  enormous  ice-floe, 
in  the  midst  of  which  was  the  "  Resolute,"  firmly  imbedded. 
The  American  captain  stayed  by  the  floe  till  it  broke  up, 
and  then  took  possession  of  the  vessel.  The  English 
Government  having  put  in  no  claim  to  the  rescued  vessel, 
Congress  bought  it  of  its  captors,  spent  $40,000  to  put  it  in 
perfect  repair,  and  then  sent  it  to  England  under  the  com- 
mand of  a  United  States  captain,  an  old  Arctic  explorer,  as  a 
present  to  the  Queen.  The  "  Resolute  "  was  a  poor  sailer. 
She  had  a  thirty  days'  passage  across  the  Atlantic,  and 
had  a  narrow  escape  from  being  wrecked  on  the  rocks  of 
the  Scilly  Isles.  She  was  received  with  all  kinds  of  honors 
at  Portsmouth,  and  a  royal  salute  was  fired  for  her  as  a 
compliment  to  the  sovereign  people.  The  Queen,  Prince 
Albert,  and  the  Prince  of  Wales  went  on  board  of  her,  and 
the  Queen  was  received  by  the  captain  with  a  very  pretty 
address  :  — 

"  Will  Your  Majesty  permit  me,  in  accordance  with  the 
wishes  of  my  countrymen,  and  in  obedience  to  the  orders  of 
my  Government,  to  restore  to  Your  Majesty  the  ship  '  Resolute,' 
not  only  as  a  mark  of  friendly  feeling  towards  Your  Majesty's 
Government,  but  as  a  token  of  love,  admiration,  and  respect  for 
Your  Majesty." 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE   CONSORT.  323 

This  was  well  done  for  a  man  who  at  first  had  requested 
not  to  be  sent  in  command  of  the  "  Resolute,"  saying, 
"  I  cannot  dance,  I  cannot  speak,  I  cannot  sing.  I  am, 
therefore,  not  the  man  to  be  sent  on  such  a  service." 

Sir  Theodore  Martin  opens  his  fifth  volume  of  the  Prince 
Consort's  Life  by  saying :  — 

" '  I  have  been  long  persuaded,'  observes  Milton,  '  that  to 
say  or  do  aught  worthy  of  imitation  or  memory,  no  purpose 
should  sooner  move  us  than  simply  the  love  of  God  and  of  man- 
kind ; '  and  in  this  spirit  the  Prince  Consort  lived  and  acted. 
Any  rule  good  for  all  men,  he  felt,  was  especially  incumbent 
upon  him,  placed  as  he  was  in  a  position  where  his  influence 
and  example,  whether  for  good  or  evil,  must  of  necessity  be 
greater  than  that  of  ordinary  men.  Speaking  in  one  of  his  let- 
ters of  being  misunderstood,  he  says,  '  I  must  console  myself 
with  the  consciousness  that  from  my  heart  I  mean  well  towards 
all  mankind,  and  have  never  done  them  aught  but  good,  and 
take  my  stand  on  truth  and  reason.'  " 

Sir  Charles  Phipps,  whose  position  in  the  royal  house- 
hold brought  him  for  years  into  many  hours'  daily  commu- 
nication with  Prince  Albert,  says  in  a  private  letter  :  — 

"  The  principle  of  right  was  so  firmly  and  immovably  rooted 
in  the  Prince,  and  its  influence  was  ever  so  present  in  his  every 
thought,  that  I  am  quite  sure  he  never  spoke  or  answered  a 
question  without  having  made  instantaneous  reference  in  his 
thoughts  to  that  principle.  His  every  word,  his  every  act,  was 
but  a  portion  of  one  great  resolution  to  do  what  was  right,  and 
to  endeavor  to  do  it  with  the  greatest  possible  kindness  and 
tenderness  to  others.  To  hear  of  a  good  action  in  anybody, 
from  a  young  child  up  to  a  great  statesman,  was  a  positive 
enjoyment  to  him,  —  a  joy  which  was  visibly  seen  in  his 
countenance." 

Mr.  Gladstone  has  said  :  — 

"  The  excellence  of  the  Prince's  character  has  become  a 
commonplace,  almost  a  by-word,  among  us.  It  is  easy  to  run 
round  the  circle  of  his  virtues,  difficult  to  find  a  place  where  the 
line  is  not  continuous.  No  doubt  he  was  eminently  happy  in 
the  persons  who  from  without  contributed  to  develop  his  capac- 


324  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY, 

ities,  —  his  uncle,  his  tutor,  and  his  wife.  But  how  completely 
did  the  material  answer  to  every  touch  that  it  received  !  How 
nearly  the  life  approximated  to  an  ideal !  .  .  .  His  biographer  has 
been  impugned  by  one  reviewer  for  the  uniformity  of  his  lauda- 
tory tone.  Now,  doubtless  it  would  be  too  much  to  expect  a 
drastic  criticism  of  the  Prince's  intellect  in  a  work  produced 
under  the  auspices  of  an  adoring  affection  ;  but  an  honest  im- 
partiality prompts  us  to  ask  whether  in  the  ethical  picture  here 
presented  to  us  there  really  is  any  trait  that  calls  for  censure  ? 
If  there  is  anything  in  the  picture  of  the  Prince  that  directly 
irritates  the  critical  faculty,  is  it  not 

'  that  fine  air, 
That  pure  serenity  of  perfect  light,' 

which  was  insipid  to  Queen  Guinivere  in  the  heyday  of  her 
blood,  but  to  which  she  did  homage  when  the  equilibrium  of  her 
nature  was  restored  ?  " 

We  all  know  now  that  that  character  of  King  Arthur,  in 
the  "  Idyls  of  the  King,"  was  drawn  from  Prince  Albert.  But 
he  did  not  know  it  when,  after  the  first  instalment  of  the 
book  had  been  published,  he  wrote  the  following  letter  to 
Tennyson  :  — 

MY  DEAR  MR.  TENNYSON,  —  Will  you  forgive  me  if  I  intrude 
upon  your  leisure  with  a  request  I  have  thought  some  little  time 
of  making,  viz..  that  you  would  be  good  enough  to  write  your 
name  in  the  accompanying  volume  of  your  "  Idyls  of  the  King  "  ? 
You  would  thus  add  a  peculiar  interest  to  the  book  containing 
those  beautiful  lays,  from  the  perusal  of  which  I  derived  the 
greatest  enjoyment.  They  quite  rekindle  the  feelings  with  which 
the  legends  of  King  Arthur  must  have  inspired  the  chivalry  of 
old,  while  the  graceful  form  in  which  they  are  presented  blends 
those  feelings  with  the  softer  tone  of  our  present  age. 

Believe  me  always  yours  truly, 

ALBERT. 

He  loved  the  book  to  the  last,  and  on  the  Crown 
Princess  of  Prussia's  last  visit  to  England  before  his 
death  he  pointed  out  passages  for  which  he  wanted  her 
to  make  illustrations. 

It  was  thinking  of  all  this  that  Tennyson,  on  issuing 
the  later  books  of  the  Idyls,  which  treat  more  fully  of  King 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE   CONSORT.  $2$ 

Arthur,  says,  writing  after  Prince  Albert's  death,  in  a  Dedi- 
cation to  his  memory,  — 

"  Since  he  held  them  dear, 
Perchance  as  finding  there,  unconsciously, 
Some  image  of  himself." 

We  have  already  seen  in  his  letter  to  the  Duke  of  Welling- 
ton his  own  conception  of  his  position  in  England,  —  adviser 
and  private  secretary  to  the  Queen,  doing  for  her  all  those 
offices  which  she  could  not  undertake  as  a  female  sovereign  ; 
patron  of  arts  and  learning ;  the  Queen's  natural  represen- 
tative in  works  of  social  improvement  and  philanthropy; 
responsible  to  England,  as  also  to  God,  for  the  training  of 
the  royal  children ;  master  of  his  household ;  the  stay,  the 
prop,  and  the  companion  of  the  Queen. 

Knowing  how  easily  scandal  grows  out  of  nothing,  in  a 
court  circle,  he  took  the  precaution  of  being  never  alone. 
If  he  went  anywhere,  he  was  always  accompanied  by  some 
member  of  his  family,  or  by  one  of  his  equerries.  Indeed, 
he  had  to  set  up  an  extra  equerry,  to  lighten  the  burden  of 
this  service. 

He  considered  it  his  duty  to  take  pains  to  know.  Noth- 
ing with  him  was  slighted.  "  If  he  spoke  to  a  painter,  a 
sculptor,  or  an  architect,"  says  Sir  Charles  Phipps,  "  a  man 
of  science,  or  an  ordinary  tradesman,  each  would  receive  an 
impression  that  the  speciality  in  the  Prince's  mind  was  his 
own  pursuit." 

There  are  many  illustrations  of  this  on  record. 

One  day  a  great  glass  manufacturer,  coming  to  the  palace 
to  see  about  some  chandeliers,  remarked,  when  the  Prince 
had  left  the  room,  "  That  is  wonderful !  He  knows  more 
about  glass  than  I  do  ; "  adding,  "  That  is  a  man  one  cannot 
like,  one  must  love  him." 

Not  only  does  the  world  owe  the  idea  of  International 
Exhibitions  to  Prince  Albert,  but  he  gave  an  immense 
impulse  to  popular  sympathy  and  interest  in  the  working- 
classes,  —  to  that  desire  to  provide  them  better  houses,  Me- 
chanics' Institutes,  Club-houses,  Friendly  Inns,  Young  Men's 
Christian  Associations,  etc.,  which  is  a  popular  form  of 


326  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

philanthropy  at  the  present  day.  He  also  took  great  inter- 
est in  everything  that  related  to  landscape  gardening  and 
the  musical  education  of  the  masses. 

Under  the  Prince's  influence  "  there  grew  up  in  the  midst 
of  the  most  brilliant  court  in  Europe  a  domestic  family  life 
so  perfect  in  its  purity  and  charm  that  it  might  well  serve  for 
a  bright  example  to  every  home  in  the  land."  And  we  have 
all  been  privileged  to  look  into  that  home-life  as  probably 
we  are  hardly  permitted  to  do  into  any  family  home-life  but 
our  own.  The  exceeding  frankness  of  the  Queen,  and  her 
desire  for  her  people's  sympathy,  intensified  by  the  loneli- 
ness of  her  exalted  station,  has  permitted  us  to  read  their 
thoughts,  to  see  their  endearments,  to  share  their  occupa- 
tions, and  to  watch  their  lives.  "  You  must  remember,"  the 
Queen  writes  to  Princess  Alice  concerning  the  Memoirs  of 
her  father,  "  that  endless  false  and  untrue  things  have  been 
said  and  written  about  us,  public  and  private,  and  that  in 
these  days  people  will  write  and  will  know ;  therefore,  the 
only  way  to  counteract  this  is  to  let  the  real  full  truth  be 
known,  and  as  much  told  as  can  be  told  with  prudence  and 
discretion ;  and  then  no  harm,  but  good,  will  be  done.  Noth- 
ing will  help  me  more  than  that  my  people  should  see  what 
I  have  lost."  "  And  the  Queen,"  adds  a  reviewer,  "  evidently 
wishes  it  to  be  widely  known  that  the  better  members  of  the 
royal  caste  work  no  less  hard,  and  have,  probably,  on  the 
whole,  fewer  enjoyments,  than  statesmen,  professional  men, 
or  others  not  immediately  connected  with  what  are  called 
par  excellence  the  '  working-classes.'  " 

Here  is  a  letter  from  Prince  Albert  to  his  daughter,  the 
Crown  Princess  of  Prussia,  which  gives  an  idea  of  his 
various  labors,  —  the  outside  duties  that  crowded  in  upon 
the  regular  labors  of  the  day.  It  is  written  eighteen  months 
before  his  death,  from  Osborne,  in  May,  1860. 

"  Your  letter  of  the  2oth  has  found  me  in  the  enjoyment  of 
the  most  glorious  air,  the  most  fragrant  odors,  the  merriest 
choir  of  birds,  and  the  most  luxuriant  verdure;  and  were  there 
not  so  many  things  that  remind  one  of  the  so-called  '  world  ' 
(that  is  to  say,  of  miserable  men),  one  might  abandon  oneself 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE    CONSORT.  327 

wholly  to  the,  enjoyment  of  the  real  world.  There  is  no  such 
good  fortune,  however,  for  poor  me ;  and,  this  being  so,  one's 
feelings  remain  upon  the  treadmill  of  never-ending  business. 
The  donkey  in  Carisbrooke  Castle,  which  you  will  remember, 
is  my  counterpart.  He,  too,  would  rather  munch  thistles  in  the 
castle  moat  than  turn  round  in  the  wheel  at  the  castle  well  ;  and 
small  are  the  thanks  he  gets  for  his  labor.  I  am  tortured,  too,  by 
the  prospect  of  two  public  dinners,  at  which  I  am,  or  rather  shall 
be,  in  the  chair.  The  one  gives  me  seven,  the  other  ten  toasts 
and  speeches,  appropriate  to  the  occasion,  but  distracting  to 
myself.  Then  I  have  to  resign  at  Oxford  the  Presidency  of 
the  British  Association,  and  later  in  the  season  to  open  the 
Statistical  Congress  of  All  Nations.  Between  these  come  the 
laying  the  foundation-stone  of  the  Dramatic  College  ;  the  dis- 
tribution of  the  prizes  at  Wellington  College,  etc.,  etc. ;  and  this 
with  the  sittings  of  my  different  commissions.  Ascot  Races  the 
delectable,  and  the  balls  and  concerts  of  the  season,  all  crowded 
into  the  month  of  June,  over  and  above  the  customary  business 
which  a  distracted  state  of  affairs  in  Europe  and  a  stormy  Par- 
liament .  .  .  make  still  more  burdensome  and  disagreeable  than 
usual.  Some  successes,  however,  gladden  me." 

At  this  time,  too,  it  was  arranged  that  the  Prince  of 
Wales,  accompanied  by  the  Duke  of  Newcastle,  should 
make  a  tour  in  Canada  and  the  United  States. 

With  so  high  a  moral  standard  himself,  Prince  Albert  was 
perhaps  less  indulgent  than  some  parents  might  have  been 
to  the  young  man's  irregularities ;  but  the  Prince  of  Wales, 
at  almost  the  same  age  his  father  was  when  he  came  to 
England,  was  a  different  man.  Probably  no  private  person 
can  estimate  the  difficulties  that  beset  the  position  of  a 
young  heir-apparent,  and  in  many  respects  the  Prince  of 
Wales  has  filled  his  with  exceptional  self-restraint  and 
ability. 

The  Prince,  under  his  father's  careful  superintendence, 
had  received  his  education  at  three  Universities,  —  Oxford, 
Cambridge,  and  Edinburgh.  He  had  also  received  some 
military  training  in  Ireland.  It  was  now  thought  desirable 
that  he  should  visit  the  American  colonies,  and  President 
Buchanan  at  Washington. 

His  journey  was   an  entire   success.      "God  bless   his 


328   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

handsome  face  and  send  him  a   good  wife  ! "   cried    the 
wives  of  the  Newfoundland  fishermen. 

In  Canada,  the  Prince  had  his  first  experience  in  presid- 
ing at  public  ceremonies.  He  laid  the  foundation-stone 
of  the  Parliament  House  at  Ottawa,  and  inaugurated  the 
magnificent  Victoria  Bridge  at  Montreal.  He  travelled  as 
Baron  Renfrew,  —  rather  to  the  disappointment  of  colonists 
and  republicans,  who  would  have  liked  him  to  bear  all  his 
titles. 

When  the  party  visited  Chicago,  it  is  rather  amusing  to 
find  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  expatiating  on  that  marvellous 
city,  which  in  twenty  years  had  acquired  a  population  of 
seventy  thousand  ! 

When  at  Washington,  the  Prince  visited  Mount  Vernon ; 
and  the  great-grandson  of  George  III.  stood  bareheaded  at 
the  tomb  of  Washington. 

Among  the  duties  of  Prince  Albert  during  that  busy 
June  of  the  year  1860  there  were  great  reviews  to  be 
attended  of  the  ardent  Volunteers,  twenty  thousand  of 
whom  were  reviewed  by  the  Queen  and  Prince  in  Hyde 
Park,  and  did  themselves  much  credit  by  their  appearance 
and  manoeuvres. 

On  January  27,  1859,  William,  the  reigning  Emperor  of 
Germany,  and  eldest  grandchild  of  the  Queen  and  Prince 
Albert,  was  born;  and  in  July,  1860,  a  little  princess  was 
added  to  the  royal  family  of  Prussia.  Loving  letters  from 
the  home  circle  at  Windsor  greeted  "  these  kindly  gifts 
from  Heaven." 

Another  gleam  of  joy  came,  too,  in  these  days  from  the 
Prussian  court,  —  a  letter  from  the  Crown  Princess,  written  a 
few  days  before  the  arrival  of  her  little  daughter,  breaking 
to  her  father  and  mother  the  desire  of  Prince  Louis  of 
Hesse,  heir  to  the  Grand  Duchy  of  Darmstadt,  to  become 
the  suitor  of  Princess  Alice ;  but  he  feared  lest  the  lady  he 
had  fallen  in  love  with  might  not  regard  his  suit  with  favor. 
Thereupon,  Princess  Alice  was  consulted,  and  proved  not 
indisposed  to  favor  the  hopes  of  Prince  Louis.  She  was  the 
pearl  of  the  family,  —  though  perhaps  the  least  handsome. 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE   CONSORT.  329 

Here  is  the  father's  letter  to  his  daughter,  the  Crown 
Princess,  on  this  happy  occasion. 

"  Only  two  words  of  joy  can  I  offer  to  the  dear  newly  made 
mother,  and  these  come  from  an  overflowing  heart.  The  little 
daughter  is  a  kindly  gift  from  Heaven  that  will,  I  trust,  procure 
for  you  many  happy  hours  in  the  days  to  come.  The  telegraph 
speaks  only  of  your  doing  well.  May  this  be  so  in  the  fullest 
sense !  Upon  the  subject  of  your  last  interesting  and  most  im- 
portant letter,  I  have  replied  to  Fritz,  who  will  communicate  to 
you  as  much  of  my  answer  as  is  good  for  you  under  present  cir- 
cumstances. Alice  is  very  grateful  for  your  love  and  kindness  for 
her,  and  the  young  man  behaves  in  a  manner  truly  admirable.3' 

Death,  however,  this  year  was  busy  in  the  German  part  of 
the  royal  family.  Aunt  Julie  (or  Juliana),  of  Saxe-Coburg, 
died.  She  had  been  the  wife  of  the  Grand-Duke  Constan- 
tine  of  Russia,  and  had  separated  from  him  on  account  of  his 
brutality.  Many  years  after,  he  purchased  from  the  heads 
of  the  Russian  Church  a  legal  divorce,  by  renouncing  his 
rights  as  heir-presumptive  of  the  Russian  throne.  He 
then  married  a  Polish  lady,  Janetta  Grudzinska,  created 
Princess  of  Lowicz,  to  whom  he  was  ardently  attached. 
His  first  wife  led  a  faded  life  in  Switzerland  and  Coburg ; 
"  but  she  retained,"  says  Prince  Albert,  "  her  vivacity  of 
mind  and  feeling,  her  vital  freshness  and  amiability,  to  the 
last."  The  Dowager- Duchess  of  Coburg  also  died,  one 
of  the  two  grandmothers  who  had  had  charge  of  Prince 
Albert  and  his  brother  in  their  motherless  youth.  Deaths, 
like  misfortunes,  seldom  come  as  "  single  spies,  but  in 
battalions." 

As  we  read  the  memoirs  of  the  last  two  years  of  Prince 
Albert's  life,  and  see  how  all  the  thoughts  of  statesmen  were 
devoted  to  the  solution  of  questions  concerning  Italy,  the 
Pope,  Austria,  United  Germany,  and  Hungary,  all  of  which 
in  a  few  years  happily  solved  themselves,  we  are  reminded 
of  how  Carlyle  warns  us  about  the  uselessness  of  worrying  : 
since  of  things  left  undone,  part  will  never  require  to  be 
done  ;  part  had  better  not  be  done  ;  and  part,  without  our 
assistance,  will  do  themselves. 


33O  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Early  in  the  autumn  of  1860  the  Queen  and  Prince 
Albert  had  a  delightful  holiday.  They  crossed  over  into 
Germany,  and  spent  two  happy  weeks  at  Coburg.  Their 
dear  daughter  the  Crown  Princess  of  Prussia  was  with  them 
with  her  baby.  "  There  is  no  doubt  that  Prince  Albert's 
heart  was  with  his  own  people,  that  Windsor  Castle  was  no 
more  a  compensation  to  him  for  Rosenau  than  it  had  been 
to  William  III.  for  Loo ;  and  that  everything  except  the 
welfare  of  England  was  subordinate  to  his  desire  for  the 
prosperity  of  Germany,  and  the  fortunes  in  particular  of  his 
own  family."  This  was  no  fault  in  the  Prince,  but  rather 
strengthens  our  sense  of  his  power  of  renunciation.  There 
can  be  no  question  of  his  entire  fidelity  to  England; 
"  But,"  says  a  reviewer,  "  it  would  explain  why  an  instinc- 
tive sense  of  this  made  him  unjustly  distrusted  by  the  Eng- 
lish people,"  —  a  distrust  that  has  always  puzzled  those 
who,  not  seeing  him  through  the  haze  of  prejudice  which 
in  England  surrounds  a  foreigner,  hold  him  to  be  the 
greatest  acquisition  (if  we  except  William  III.)  ever  made 
by  the  court  of  England. 

During  his  three  weeks'  stay  at  Coburg  the  Prince  came 
near  meeting  with  a  fearful  accident.  The  horses  in  his 
barouche  ran  away,  and,  undeterred  by  the  fatal  example  of 
the  Duke  of  Orleans,  he  jumped  from  his  carriage.  Happily 
he  was  not  very  badly  injured,  and  only  had  to  keep  his 
room  for  a  couple  of  days.  But  on  their  return  to  England 
the  Queen  wrote  thus  to  the  Keeper  of  her  Privy  Purse  : 

"...  The  Queen  comes  now  to  the  subject  which  she  has 
mentioned  to  no  one  yet,  but  about  which  she  has  quite  made 
up  her  mind.  Perhaps  from  the  Queen's  calmness  at  the  time, 
and  her  anxiety  that  no  one  should  think  the  Prince  was  seri- 
ously hurt,  as  well  as  to  prevent  her  dear  brother  and  host,  the 
Duke  of  Coburg,  from  being  more  distressed  than  he  already 
was,  Sir  Charles  Phipps  may  have  thought  that  the  Queen  did 
not  fully  admit  the  awfulness  of  the  danger  which  her  dear  hus- 
band had  been  exposed  to,  or  the  providential  escape  he  had 
from  all  really  serious  injury ;  but  it  is  when  the  Queen  feels  most 
deeply  that  she  always  appears  calmest,  and  she  could  not,  and 
dared  not,  allow  herself  to  speak  of  what  might  have  been,  or  even 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE   CONSORT.  331 

to  admit  to  herself  (and  she  cannot  and  dare  not  now)  the  entire 
danger  ;  for  her  head  would  turn.  It  is  necessity  and  principle 
that  the  Queen  should  act  thus  on  all  occasions  of  danger ;  and 
she  thinks  it  right." 

A  fund  was  therefore  placed  at  the  disposition  of  the 
town  of  Coburg,  as  the  Queen's  thank-offering  for  her  hus- 
band's escape.  It  was  called  the  Victoria  Fund,  and  its 
object  was  to  assist  young  men  and  women  in  the  lower 
walks  of  life,  apprenticing  the  former,  or  buying  tools  for 
them ;  giving  marriage  portions  or  educational  advantages 
to  the  latter.  "  I  am  thinking  of  it  day  and  night,"  adds 
the  Queen,  "  till  it  is  done." 

The  Duke  of  Newcastle  reported  that  the  tour  of  the 
Prince  of  Wales  in  the  British  Provinces  and  the  United 
States  had  been  an  entire  success.  "  Everywhere,"  he  says, 
"  the  utmost  order  prevailed ;  and  indeed  nothing  could 
be  more  remarkable  than  the  mixture  of  interest  and  good- 
humored  curiosity  everywhere  displayed,  with  respect  and 
desire  to  conform  to  the  expressed  wish  to  avoid  outward 
demonstrations." 

President  Buchanan  wrote  a  letter  to  the  Queen,  which 
Lord  Palmerston  characterized  as  doing  equal  honor  to  the 
good  feelings  and  just  appreciation  of  the  person  who  wrote 
it  and  to  the  royal  personage  to  whom  it  refers. 

The  Queen  replied  in  an  equally  cordial  and  creditable 
letter.  The  young  Prince  reached  home  early  in  Novem- 
ber. The  Duke  of  Newcastle  received  the  Order  of  the 
Garter. 

In  December,  the  Empress  Eugenie  crossed  over  to 
Osborne  and  paid  a  brief,  informal  visit  incognita  ;  but  it  was 
a  great  change  from  the  days  of  mutual  delight  and  satisfac- 
tion that  attended  her  earlier  intercourse  with  the  English 
royal  family.  "  She  was  thin  and  pale,"  writes  the  Queen, 
"  but  as  kind,  as  amiable,  and  as  natural  as  she  had  always 
been." 

From  this  December  dates  Prince  Albert's  failing  health. 
He  was  fast  breaking  down,  and  indeed  may  be  said  to 
have  never  had  a  day  of  perfect  health  again.  The  Christmas 


332  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

was  brightened  by  the  happiness  of  the  young  affianced 
couple,  Princess  Alice  and  Prince  Louis,  of  which  Prince 
Albert  says,  "  Alice  and  Louis  are  as  happy  as  mortals  can 
be,  and  I  need  hardly  say  that  that  makes  my  heart  as  a 
father  glad." 

Here  I  abridge  from  Sir  Theodore  Martin's  book  an 
account  of  the  Prince's  manner  of  life  and  his  daily 
occupations. 

He  rose  early,  and  by  the  time  most  people  in  the  palace 
were  stirring,  he  had  made  good  progress  in  the  day's  labors. 
Summer  or  winter,  he  was  up  at  seven,  dressed,  and  went  to 
his  sitting-room,  where  in  winter  a  fire  was  burning,  and  a 
green-shaded  student's  lamp  was  lit.  He  read  and  answered 
letters,  never  allowing  his  immense  correspondence  to  fall 
into  arrears,  and  prepared  drafts  for  the  Queen's  considera- 
tion on  matters  of  importance.  The  last  paper  he  drew  up 
in  this  way  was  on  the  eve  of  his  last  illness,  on  the  Slidell 
and  Mason  affair.  He  brought  it  to  the  Queen,  Decem- 
ber i,  1 86 1,  at  8  A.  M.,  having  risen  to  write  it,  ill  and 
suffering  as  he  was.  saying  as  he  gave  it  to  her,  "  I  am  so 
weak  I  could  scarcely  hold  the  pen." 

From  eight  till  breakfast-time  he  read  over  fresh  letters 
and  despatches,  already  read  over  by  the  Queen  and  placed 
by  her,  ready  for  his  perusal,  on  the  table  in  his  sitting- 
room.  Every  morning  the  leading  newspapers  were  placed 
for  him  on  a  table  near  the  breakfast-table.  He  would  read 
out  loud  to  the  Queen,  as  they  breakfasted,  any  interesting 
item  or  particularly  good  article. 

In  his  early  married  life  he  and  the  Queen  walked  to- 
gether after  breakfast  till  ten,  except  on  the  days  he  went 
out  shooting ;  later,  the  daily  walk  was  after  ten.  His  step, 
his  wife  records,  was  quick  and  active  along  the  passages  or 
on  the  stairs.  If  he  went  out  shooting  (his  only  real 
amusement),  he  was  always  home  by  luncheon-time.  "  He 
never  went  out  or  came  home,"  records  the  Queen, 
"without  coming  through  my  room  or  into  my  dressing- 
room,  with  a  smile,  saying,  if  I  were  dressing,  '  Sehr  schon,' 
or  something  kindly ;  and  I  treasure  up  everything  I 


PKINCESS  ALICE. 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE   CONSORT.  333 

heard  to  tell  him,  and  kept  every  letter  or  despatch  to  show 
him  ;  and  I  was  always  vexed  or  nervous  if  I  had  any  foolish 
draft  or  despatch  to  put  before  him,  as  I  knew  it  would  dis- 
tress or  irritate  him  and  affect  his  delicate  stomach." 

Even  in  moments  of  so-called  recreation  his  brain  could 
have  had  little  rest.  The  day  was  too  short  for  all  the  claims 
on  his  attention,  and  his  frequent  attacks  of  illness,  in  them- 
selves slight,  showed  his  body  was  growing  weaker,  while 
every  day  increased  the  strain  upon  his  mind.  In  every 
direction  his  counsel  and  help  were  sought.  In  the  royal 
household,  in  his  family  circle,  among  his  numerous  kins- 
folks, at  home  and  abroad,  his  judgment  and  guidance  were 
being  constantly  appealed  to.  Every  enterprise  of  national 
importance  claimed  his  attention,  and  in  all  things  that  con- 
cerned the  welfare  of  England  at  home  and  abroad  his 
accurate  and  varied  knowledge  and  his  political  sagacity 
made  him  looked  to  as  an  authority  by  leading  statesmen. 
But  all  this  fatigue  of  body  and  brain  did  not  deprive  him 
of  his  natural  cheerfulness.  "At  breakfast  and  luncheon," 
says  his  wife,  "  and  also  at  our  family  dinners,  he  sat  at  the  top 
of  the  table,  and  kept  us  all  enlivened  by  droll  stories  of  his 
childhood  or  his  Coburg  life,  and  by  his  other  interesting 
conversation.  He  told  a  story  with  great  power  of  mimicry, 
and  would  laugh  most  heartily.  Then  he  would  entertain 
us  with  talk  about  the  most  interesting  and  important  topics 
of  the  present  or  former  days,  on  which  it  was  ever  a  pleas- 
ure to  hear  him  speak." 

Early  in  the  year  King  Frederick  William  of  Prussia, 
whose  mind  had  been  failing  for  some  years,  died.  His 
brother,  who  had  been  Regent  during  his  illness,  succeeded 
him,  and  in  the  course  of  events  became  Emperor  of  Ger- 
many. In  consequence  of"  the  death  of  the  King,  the 
Princess  Royal  of  England  became  Crown  Princess  of 
Prussia.  She  was  beside  the  old  man  on  his  deathbed. 

At  the  close  of  the  month  Dr.  Baly,  the  Prince  Consort's 
physician,  was  killed  in  an  accident  on  a  railroad,  —  a  most 
terrible  loss  to  the  country,  as  it  proved,  for  he  had  long 
known  and  understood  the  constitution  of  the  Prince,  who 


334  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

now,  just  as  his  health  was  failing,  had  to  put  himself  into 
new  hands. 

February  10  was  kept  by  the  Queen  and  Prince  as  the 
twenty-first  anniversary  of  their  wedding.  It  was  celebrated 
quietly,  for  the  day  was  Sunday.  "  Very  few  wives  can  say, 
with  me,"  writes  the  Queen  to  her  uncle,  "that  their  hus- 
bands at  the  end  of  twenty-one  years  are  not  only  full  of 
the  friendship,  kindness,  and  affection  which  a  truly  happy 
marriage  brings  with  it,  but  of  the  same  tender  love  as  in 
the  first  days  of  marriage.  We  missed  dear  Mamma  and 
three  of  our  children,  but  had  six  dear  ones  round  us,  and 
assembled  with  us  in  the  evening  those  of  our  household  who 
had  been  with  us  then." 

As  we  read  the  record  of  the  Prince's  life  and  the  Queen's, 
it  is  pleasant  to  find  them  reading  the  books  we  read  and 
love.  Besides  history  of  the  graver  sort,  and  poetry,  the 
Prince  found  relaxation  in  novels.  We  read  of  his  plea- 
sure and  the  Queen's  in  all  George  Eliot's  books,  in 
Kingsley's  stories,  and  in  his  "Saint's  Tragedy."  Some 
volume  of  Sir  Walter  Scott  was  kept  always  on  hand,  and 
read  when  he  was  too  tired  to  read  what  was  less  dear 
and  familiar. 

In  February,  1861,  the  Duchess  of  Kent  had  been  staying 
with  the  royal  family  at  Buckingham  Palace.  The  Queen 
and  Prince  then  went  to  Osborne  House  for  ten  days'  quiet, 
and  the  Duchess  returned  to  Frogmore,  near  Windsor  Castle, 
her  own  home.  Suddenly  Sir  George  Couper,  her  secretary 
and  controller  of  her  household  and  affairs,  died,  after  two 
days'  illness.  Prince  Albert  writes  :  — 

"  The  poor  Mamma's  health  has  not  been  injured  by  the  shock ; 
she  feels  the  loss  deeply,  and  will  feel  it  more  as  time  goes  on. 
She  has  had  much  to  suffer  of  late,  her  right  arm  being  greatly 
swollen  and  very  painful,  which  puts  a  stop  to  her  writing,  work- 
ing, or  playing  on  the  piano,  and  she  cannot  read  much,  or  bear 
to  be  read  to  long  at  a  time.  She  is  to  come  to  us  in  town  when 
we  return  there  on  Friday.  She  will  not  go  back  to  Clarence 
House,  and  with  the  children  about  her  she  will  have  more  to 
amuse  her. '' 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE    CONSORT.  335 

But  the  days  of  the  poor  Duchess  were  numbered.  She 
was  suffering  from  an  abscess  in  her  arm,  for  which  she  had 
an  operation,  and  her  strength  gave  way  under  the  strain  of 
pain.  The  Queen  and  Prince  were  suddenly  summoned. 
The  story  of  her  deathbed  is  very  touching,  as  told  by  the 
Queen  :  — 

"With  a  trembling  heart,  I  went  up  the  staircase  and  entered 
the  bedroom  ;  and  here,  on  a  sofa  supported  by  cushions,  the 
room  much  darkened,  sat,  leaning  back,  my  beloved  mother, 
breathing  rather  heavily,  in  her  silk  dressing-gown,  with  her  cap 
on,  looking  quite  herself.  One  of  those  about  her  said,  'The 
end  will  be  easy.'  Oh,  what  agony  — what  despair  was  this! 
Seeing  that  our  presence  did  not  disturb  her,  I  knelt  down  and 
kissed  her  dear  hand,  and  placed  it  next  my  cheek ;  but  though 
she  opened  her  eyes,  she  did  not,  I  think,  know  me.  She  brushed 
my  hand  off;  and  the  dreadful  reality  was  before  me,  that  for 
the  first  time  she  did  not  know  the  child  she  had  ever  received 
with  such  tender  smiles.  I  went  out  to  sob.  I  asked  the  doc- 
tors if  there  was  no  hope?  They  said  they  feared  none  what- 
ever, for  consciousness  had  left  her.  It  was  suffusion  of  water 
on  the  brain  that  had  come  on.  As  the  night  wore  on  into 
morning,  I  lay  down  on  the  sofa  at  the  foot  of  my  bed,  where  at 
least  I  could  lie  still.  I  heard  each  hour  strike,  the  cocks  crow, 
the  dogs  barking  in  the  distance.  Every  sound  seemed  to  strike 
into  my  inmost  soul.  At  four  I  went  down  again.  All  still; 
nothing  was  to  be  heard  but  the  heavy  breathing,  and  the  strik- 
ing at  every  quarter  of  the  old  repeater,  —  a  large  watch  in  a 
tortoiseshell  case  which  had  belonged  to  my  poor  father,  —  the 
sound  of  which  brought  back  all  the  recollections  of  my  child- 
hood ;  for  I  always  used  to  hear  it  at  night,  but  had  not  heard 
it  for  twenty-three  years.  I  remained  kneeling  and  standing  by 
that  beloved  parent,  whom  it  seemed  too  awful  to  see  hopelessly 
leaving  me.  .  .  .  Then,  at  the  last,  Albert  took  me  out  of  the  room 
for  a  short  time  ;  but  I  could  not  remain.  When  I  returned,  the 
window  was  wide  open,  and  both  doors.  I  sat  on  a  footstool, 
holding  her  dear  hand.  Meantime  the  face  grew  paler  (though 
in  truth  her  cheeks  had  the  pretty  fresh  color  they  always  had 
to  the  last).  The  breathing  became  easier.  I  fell  on  my  knees, 
holding  the  beloved  hand  that  was  still  soft  and  warm,  though 
heavier.  I  felt  as  if  my  heart  would  break.  Convulsed  with 
sobs,  I  fell  upon  the  dear  hand  when  all  breathing  ceased,  and 
covered  it  with  kisses.  Albert  lifted  me  up,  and  took  me  into 


336   ENGLAND  IN   THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

the  next  room,  himself  entirely  melted  into  tears,  which  is 
unusual  for  him,  deep  as  his  feelings  are.  He  clasped  me  in  his 
arms.  I  asked  if  all  was  over.  He  said, 'Yes.' 

"  O  God  !  —  how  awful  —  how  mysterious  !  But  what  a 
blessed  end !  Her  gentle  spirit  at  rest,  her  sufferings  over. 
But  I — I,  wretched  child,  who  had  lost  the  mother  I  so  ten- 
derly loved,  from  whom  for  these  forty-one  years  I  had  never 
been  parted,  except  for  a  few  weeks  !  My  childhood  —  every- 
thing—  seemed  to  crowd  upon  me.  I  seemed  to  have  lived 
through  a  life,  —  to  have  become  old." 

The  Duchess  left  Prince  Albert  her  executor,  and  this 
entailed  on  him  great  and  harassing  labor ;  for  Sir  George 
Couper,  who  had  managed  her  affairs  for  thirty  years, 
having  just  died,  nobody  could  tell  him  anything,  and  he 
had  to  work  out  everything  for  himself,  as  it  were,  in  the 
dark. 

"  Besides  the  shock  of  losing  one  so  dear,  the  strain  of  sub- 
duing his  own  emotions,  that  he  might  the  better  sustain  and 
comfort  the  Queen  in  this  the  first  great  sorrow  of  her  life,  the 
Prince  was  compelled  to  take  upon  himself  at  this  time  more 
than  his  wonted  labors  in  lightening  for  Her  Majesty  the  daily 
and  hourly  duties  of  communication  with  her  ministers.  Then 
all  the  painful  and  harassing  labors  which  devolved  on  him, 
as  the  Duchess'  executor,  of  examining  the  papers  and  corre- 
spondence, accumulations  during  a  long  and  busy  life,  had  to  be 
carefully  looked  over,  the  claims  of  kinsfolk  and  of  old  retainers 
had  to  be  adjusted ;  and  all  these  things  aggravated  his  fatigue. 
He  bore  everything  without  a  murmur  in  this  time  of  great 
family  distress,  giving  fresh  proofs  of  his  patient,  cheerful,  and 
considerate  spirit,  thinking  for  all.  and  feeling  for  all,  —  toil, 
trial,  and  disappointment  seeming  only  to  ripen  his  character 
into  fuller  beauty." 

The  bright  spot  in  these  sad  days  was  the  presence  of  the 
Crown  Princess  of  Prussia,  who  hurried  over  to  England  to 
comfort  her  mother  and  father  in  their  grief,  and  was  with 
them  ten  days.  Prince  Albert  writes  to  Baron  Stockmar 
of  the  Queen  :  — 

"  Her  mind  is  greatly  upset.  She  feels  her  whole  childhood 
rush  back  once  more  upon  her  memory;  and  with  these  recollec- 
tions comes  the  thought  of  many  a  sad  hour.  Her  grief  is 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE    CONSORT.  337 

extreme,  and  she  feels  acutely  the  loss  of  one  whom  she  cher- 
ished and  tended  with  affectionate  and  dutiful  devotion.  For 
the  last  two  years  her  constant  care  and  occupation  have  been 
to  keep  watch  over  her  mother's  comfort,  and  the  influence  of 
this  upon  her  own  character  has  been  most  valuable.  In  body 
she  is  well,  though  terribly  nervous,  and  the  children  are  a  dis- 
turbance to  her.  She  remains  almost  entirely  alone.  You  may 
conceive  it  was,  and  is,  no  easy  task  for  me  to  comfort  and  sup- 
port her,  and  to  keep  others  at  a  distance,  and  yet  at  the  same 
time  not  to  throw  away  the  opportunity  which  a  time  like  the 
present  affords  of  binding  the  family  together  in  a  closer  bond 
of  unity.  With  business  I  am  well-nigh  overwhelmed.  .  .  ." 

A  little  later,  in  the  month  of  May,  Prince  Louis  of  Hesse 
came  courting  to  Osborne,  and  Uncle  Leopold  of  Belgium 
and  his  second  son  came  too.  The  two  Princes  caught  the 
measles,  and  had  to  be  nursed  through  a  severe  illness,  the 
Belgian  Prince  being  dangerously  ill.  All,  indeed,  in  that 
year  seemed  to  go  wrong  in  Europe,  and  with  us  were  the 
early  months  of  a  fratricidal  war. 

The  last  public  occasion  in  which  the  Prince  was  prom- 
inent was  on  the  5th  of  June,  when  he  opened  the  Royal 
Horticultural  Gardens  to  the  public.  The  pallid,  worn  look 
of  his  face  was  then  remarked  upon.  The  next  day  came 
news  of  the  death  of  Cavour. 

All  through  the  summer  the  Prince  continued  to  have 
sharp  little  attacks  of  illness.  "  Am  ill,  feverish,  miserable, 
with  pains  in  my  limbs,"  are  frequent  entries  in  his  Journal. 
Alas  !  if  his  physician,  Dr.  Baly,  had  been  living,  he  might, 
knowing  the  Prince's  constitution,  have  checked  these 
symptoms  in  time. 

The  summer  brought  many  family  visitors,  among  them 
Maximilian  and  poor  Carlotta.  The  Prince  formed  a  most 
favorable  impression  of  the  Archduke,  of  which  I  have  told 
elsewhere. 

In  August,  the  Queen  and  Prince  went  to  Ireland,  and 
visited  Mr.  Herbert,  of  Muckross,  and  Killarney.  That  sum- 
mer, too,  the  Prince  of  Wales  visited  Germany,  his  object 
being  to  make  the  acquaintance  of  Princess  Alexandra  of 
Denmark,  who  was  then  on  a  visit  to  some  German  baths. 


338  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

This  year  (1861)  was  a  fatal  year  for  royalties.  The 
Crown  Princess  of  Prussia  was  seriously  ill  from  a  cold 
caught  at  King  William's  coronation.  All  the  royal  family 
of  Portugal  were  ill  of  typhoid  fever ;  the  King  —  a  kinsman 
and  personal  friend  of  Prince  Albert  —  died  of  it.  He  had 
before  this  lost  his  sweet  wife,  Stephanie  ;  and  Queen  Victoria 
writes  in  her  Journal :  "  The  only  comfort  in  his  death  is 
that  he  —  dear,  pure,  excellent  Pedro  —  is  spared  the  pang 
and  sacrifice  of  having  to  marry  again." 

Many  anxieties,  and  perhaps  some  special  private  grief, 
weighing  upon  Prince  Albert's  heart,  during  the  autumn 
of  this  fatal  year,  brought  on  sleeplessness.  Everything  he 
did  now  made  him  "  tired  and  weak."  Notwithstanding,  he 
drove  in  a  pouring  rain  to  the  Military  College  at  Sandhurst 
to  inspect  its  new  buildings.  A  day  or  two  after,  he  made 
a  hurried  journey  to  Cambridge  to  look  after  the  affairs  of 
his  son.  He  returned  to  Windsor  very  seriously  ill.  The 
next  day  came  news  of  the  "  Trent "  affair,  when  Captain 
Wilkes,  of  the  United  States  Navy,  took  Messrs.  Slidell  and 
Mason,  envoys  to  France  from  the  Confederate  States,  out 
of  a  British  mail-steamer.  The  excitement  in  England  was 
intense.  The  Prince  rose  from  his  sleepless  bed  at  dawn  on 
the  morning  of  November  28,  to  write  a  draft  of  a  memo- 
randum on  the  subject  which  he  thought  might  be  of  use. 
These  were  the  words  he  wrote,  in  pain  and  weakness ;  the 
last  he  ever  penned  :  — 

"  The  Queen  returns  these  important  drafts,  which  upon  the 
whole  she  approves  ;  but  she  cannot  help  feeling  that  the  main 
draft  —  that  for  communication  to  the  American  Government  — 
is  somewhat  meagre.  She  should  have  liked  to  have  seen  the 
expression  of  a  hope  that  the  American  captain  did  not  act  under 
instructions,  or,  if  he  did,  he  misapprehended  them.  That  the 
United  States  Government  must  be  fully  aware  that  the  British 
Government  could  not  allow  its  flag  to  be  insulted,  and  the 
security  of  its  mail  communications  be  put  in  jeopardy ;  and 
Her  Majesty's  Government  are  unwilling  to  believe  that  the 
United  States  Government  intended  wantonly  to  put  an  insult 
upon  this  country,  and  to  add  to  their  many  distressing  compli- 
cations by  forcing  a  question  of  dispute  upon  us,  and  that  we 
are  therefore  glad  to  believe  that  upon  a  full  consideration  of  the 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE   CONSORT.  339 

circumstances  of  the  undoubted  breach  of  international  law 
committed,  they  would  spontaneously  offer  such  redress  as 
alone  could  satisfy  this  country;  viz.,  the  restoration  of  the 
unfortunate  passengers,  and  a  suitable  apology." 

As  we  know,  the  Government  of  Mr.  Lincoln  did  not 
hesitate  to  make  this  apology,  and  restore  Messrs.  Slidell 
and  Mason  to  liberty;  but  before  this  came  to  pass,  the 
Prince  was  no  longer  by  his  wife's  side  to  be  her  support 
and  her  adviser. 

After  another  night  of  shivering  and  sleeplessness,  the 
Prince  sent  for  his  new  physician,  Dr.  Jenner,  who  sum- 
moned Sir  James  Clark  for  consultation.  The  Prince,  ill  as 
he  was,  was  allowed  to  receive  detailed  particulars  of  the 
King  of  Portugal's  illness  and  death,  and  remarked  that  he 
hoped  his  own  illness  was  not  fever,  as  he  was  sure  if  it  was 
it  would  be  fatal  to  him. 

Lord  Palmerston,  then  Prime  Minister,  was  anxious  for 
more  medical  advice ;  but  Sir  James  Clark  considered  this 
unnecessary ;  he  did  not  think  the  disease  would  turn  into 
low  fever. 

Alas !  it  seems  as  if  after  the  break-down  that  had 
been  going  on  for  months,  nothing  else  should  have  been 
*  expected. 

All  the  next  day  the  Prince  lay  listless.  "  No  book," 
says  his  wife,  "  suited  him,"  though  she  and  Princess  Alice 
tried  "Silas  Marner  "  and  "The  Warden."  "The  Dodd 
Family"  was  then  tried  ;  but  he  disliked  it,  as  a  man  in  his 
condition  would  naturally  do.  Then  they  resolved  "  to  try 
Walter  Scott  to-morrow." 

Ten  days  of  this  miserable  weakness  succeeded ;  the 
Prince  trying  to  fight  against  his  illness,  but  suffering  all 
the  time  from  total  inability  to  take  food,  and  from  sleep- 
lessness. At  last  his  illness  was  pronounced  to  be  low  fever, 
or,  as  we  should  call  it,  typhoid.  The  word  "  fever  "  was, 
however,  concealed  from  the  Prince.  "  My  heart,"  says 
the  Queen,  "  seemed  ready  to  burst ;  but  I  cheered  myself 
by  thinking  how  many  people  have  fever.  .  .  .  Good  Alice 
was  very  courageous,  and  comforted  me."  And,  indeed, 


340  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Princess  Alice  all  through  these  days  of  trial  was  her 
mother's  and  her  father's  guardian  angel. 

The  physicians  seem  not  to  have  known  the  frailty  of 
the  Prince's  constitution,  or  not  to  have  been  made  aware 
of  the  great  strain  put  upon  him  by  the  labors  and  anxieties 
of  the  past  year. 

He  was  restless,  and  wanted  to  be  moved  from  room  to 
room.  By  the  ninth  day  his  mind  at  times  began  to  wan- 
der ;  but  he  listened  with  pleasure  while  the  Queen  read 
"  Peveril  of  the  Peak." 

When  one  thinks  of  the  devoted  loyalty  of  dear  Sir 
Walter  Scott  shown  even  to  such  a  sovereign  as  George 
IV.,  one  wishes  he  could  have  known  of  the  Queen  of 
England,  soothing  with  his  imaginations  the  weary  hours 
of  wakefulness  of  such  a  man. 

When  his  wife  would  bend  over  him  he  would  stroke  her 
face,  and  whisper,  in  the  tongue  of  his  childhood,  "  Liebes 
Frauchen," —  dear  little  wife.  "These  caresses,"  she  said, 
"  touched  me  so  much,  made  me  so  grateful !  " 

Still,  Lord  Palmerston  (confined  to  his  room  by  gout) 
urged  further  advice  from  medical  men,  and  others  were 
called  in.  They  expressed  themselves  satisfied  that  all  had 
been  done  that  could  be. 

Music  and  art  still  gave  him  pleasure.  There  was  a 
beautiful  Madonna,  painted  on  porcelain,  which  he  had  him- 
self given  to  the  Queen,  and  to  which  his  face  turned  with 
pleasure  every  time  he  was  carried  past  it,  saying,  "  It 
helps  me  through  the  day;"  and  it  pleased  him  to  hear 
Princess  Alice  play,  in  the  adjoining  chamber, "  Ein'  feste 
Burg  ist  unser  Gott,"  Luther's  grand  German  national 
hymn. 

But  "  the  overwhelming  calamity "  as  Lord  Palmerston 
called  the  Prince's  death  (he  who  at  one  time  had  been 
unfriendly  to  the  Prince)  was  near  at  hand. 

On  the  fourteenth  day  of  his  illness  it  was  thought  by  the 
doctors  that  the  crisis  might  be  passed.  "  It  was  a  bright 
morning,"  says  the  Queen,  "the  sun  just  rising,  and  shining 
brightly.  Never  can  I  forget  how  beautiful  my  darling 


DEATH  OF  THE  PRINCE    CONSORT.  341 

looked,  lying  with  his  face  lit  up  by  the  rising  sun,  his  eyes, 
unusually  bright,  gazing,  as  it  were,  on  unseen  objects,  and 
not  taking  notice  of  me." 

The  Prince  of  Wales  had  now  been  sent  for,  and  had 
arrived  during  the  night.  Alas !  all  that  day  death  was 
slowly  creeping  over  its  victim ;  but  his  wife  hoped  and 
feared,  and  strengthened  herself  to  be  calm  for  his  sake,  till 
towards  evening  she  broke  down. 

Here  is  the  last  scene  told  from  her  memoranda :  — 

"  About  half-past  five  I  went  back  to  his  room  and  sat  down 
by  the  side  of  his  bed,  which  had  been  wheeled  into  the  middle 
of  his  chamber.  '  Gutes  Frauchen,'  he  said,  and  kissed  me  ;  and 
then  gave  a  sort  of  piteous  moan,  or  rather  sigh,  not  of  pain,  but 
as  if  he  felt  he  were  leaving  me,  and  laid  his  head  upon  my 
shoulder,  and  I  put  my  arm  under  his.  Then  he  seemed  to 
doze  and  to  wander.  Sometimes  he  spoke  French.  Alice 
came  in  and  kissed  him,  and  he  took  her  hand.  Bertie,  Helena, 
Louise,  and  Arthur  came  in  one  after  the  other  and  took  his 
hand,  and  Arthur  kissed  it.  But  he  was  dozing,  and  did  not 
perceive  it.  Then  those  of  his  household  came  in  and  kissed 
his  hand,  dreadfully  overcome.  Thank  God  I  was  able  to  com- 
mand myself,  and  to  remain  perfectly  calm  and  sitting  by  his 
side." 

Late  in  the  night  the  Queen  retired  a  few  moments 
into  her  own  chamber,  whence  she  was  recalled  by  the 
Prince's  breathing  growing  more  difficult.  Bending  over 
him,  she  whispered  "  Es  ist  kleines  Frauchen."  He  bowed 
his  head  and  kissed  her. 

Again  she  left  him  for  a  few  moments,  duties  pressing 
upon  her  even  then.  She  was  recalled  by  Princess  Alice. 
She  took  his  left  hand,  which  was  growing  cold,  and  knelt 
down  by  his  side.  On  the  other  side  of  the  bed  was  Prin- 
cess Alice,  and  at  its  foot  the  Prince  of  Wales  and  Princess 
Helena.  Others  of  the  household  and  a  kinsman,  a 
German  Prince,  stood  around. 

The  Castle  clock  struck  a  quarter  to  eleven  the  i4th  of 
December,  1861.  Calm  and  peaceful  grew  the  form  so 
loved.  The  features  settled  into  the  beauty  of  a  perfectly 


342   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

serene  repose.  Two  or  three  long  but  gentle  breaths  were 
drawn,  "and  that  great  soul,"  says  his  biographer,  "had 
fled  to  seek  a  nobler  scope  for  its  aspirations,  in  the  world 
within  the  veil,  for  which  it  had  often  yearned,  where  there 
is  rest  for  the  weary,  and  where  the  spirits  of  just  men  are 
made  perfect." 

Mr.  Gladstone,  between  whom  and  the  Prince  there  was 
not  in  all  points  cordial  sympathy,  says  of  the  biography 
written  by  Sir  Theodore  Martin  at  the  command  of  Her 
Majesty :  — 

"  It  has  a  yet  higher  title  to  our  esteem  in  its  faithful  care 
and  solid  merit  as  a  biography.  From  the  midst  of  the  hottest 
glow  of  earthly  splendor,  it  has  drawn  forth  to  public  contem- 
plation a  genuine  piece  of  solid,  sterling,  and  unworldly  excel- 
lence, a  pure  and  holy  life,  from  which  every  man,  and  most  of 
all  every  Christian,  may  learn  many  an  ennobling  lesson,  on 
which  he  may  do  well  to  meditate  when  he  communes  with  his 
own  heart  and  in  his  chamber,  and  is  still." 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

LORD     BEACONSFIELD. 

WHEN  on  that  unhappy  night  in  December,  1861,  the 
brightness  of  the  Queen's  life  passed  away  forever, 
Lord  Palmerston  was  in  office  as  her  Prime  Minister.  And 
though  he  was  in  general  not  a  man  of  sympathies  or  senti- 
ment, he  was  the  first  to  realize  the  irreparableness  of  the 
loss  his  sovereign  had  sustained,  and  to  appreciate  her 
meaning  when  she  spoke  of  having  to  "  begin  a  new 
reign." 

He  had  become  Prime  Minister  when,  in  the  midst  of 
the  Crimean  war,  the  ministry  of  Lord  Aberdeen  broke  to 
pieces  under  the  terrible  strain.  The  cry  of  the  country 
was  then  for  Palmerston.  Where  was  Palmerston?  —  the 
one  man  whose  energy,  activity,  and  vim  (though  he  was 
then  seventy)  could  extricate  England  from  the  difficulties 
in  which  by  the  departing  cabinet  she  had  been  involved. 

From  1855  to  the  close  of  his  life,  in  1865,  Lord  Palmer- 
ston continued  on  the  most  cordial  terms  with  the  mistress 
whom  he  served.  The  old  quarrel  about  his  wilful  and 
independent  action,  when  Secretary  for  Foreign  Affairs,  was 
all  forgotten ;  and  though  the  great  difference  between  the 
jaunty  Premier  and  the  Prince,  on  whom  responsibility  had 
weighed  ever  since  he  was  nineteen,  had  precluded  great 
sympathy  of  character,  both  the  Queen  and  Prince  had 
cordially  appreciated  Lord  Palmerston's  ever-present  sense 
of  the  dignity  of  England,  and  his  cheerful  confidence  that 
no  matter  what  difficulties  beset  his  countrymen,  they  would 
come  out  triumphant  in  the  end. 

The  premiership  came  to  Lord  Palmerston  only  when  he 
had  more  than  reached  middle  life  ;  but  at  the  age  of 
twenty-three,  in  1807,  he  had  held  his  first  office  in  the 


344  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

cabinet  of  the  Duke  of  Portland  as  a  Lord  of  the  Admiralty, 
and  he  had  been  in  Government  employ,  with  little  inter- 
mission, for  forty-nine  years.  The  Foreign  Orifice  was  his 
own  especial  office.  He  hated  any  interference  with  him 
in  his  management  of  it,  as  much  as  a  millionnaire  banker 
might  object  to  supervision  of  his  correspondence,  or  inter- 
meddling in  his  counting-room.  This  was  the  cause  of  his 
disagreement  with  the  Queen  and  Lord  John  Russell  in 
1851,  and  his  dismissal  from  his  beloved  office,  to  which 
he  never  returned.  But  he  gave  Lord  John  what  he  called 
his  "  tit- for- tat "  only  a  few  months  after,  by  breaking  up 
his  cabinet.  To  the  credit  of  Lord  John's  generosity,  be  it 
said  that  he  put  aside  all  personal  considerations,  and  con- 
sented to  serve  as  Colonial  Secretary  under  his  old  sub- 
ordinate in  1855,  and  even  to  accept  the  Foreign  Office 
in  1859. 

The  period  of  Lord  Palmerston's  premiership,  from  1859 
until  his  death,  was  marked  by  domestic  and  foreign  wor- 
ries rather  than  by  great  events.  Abroad,  English  diplo- 
macy had  to  deal  with  disputes  with  the  United  States 
concerning  privateers  and  the  "Alabama's"  depredations; 
with  the  Emperor  Alexander  II.  in  1863  about  his  severe 
repression  of  the  political  aspirations  of  the  Poles;  about 
the  affairs  of  the  Danish  Duchies  and  the  Danish  succes- 
sion, —  a  question  which,  it  is  said,  only  two  men  in  Europe 
understood  ;  with  the  pretensions  of  the  King  of  Prussia ; 
with  the  aspirations  of  King  Victor  Emmanuel  to  be  king 
of  Italy ;  with  the  war  in  Lombardy,  ended  by  the  Peace 
of  Villafranca ;  with  a  little  war  in  New  Zealand,  and  an- 
other in  China.  At  home,  the  House  of  Commons  quar- 
relled with  the  House  of  Lords  about  its  sole  right  to 
originate  or  alter  bills  relating  to  taxation ;  the  men  of 
Manchester  were  indignant  with  the  Government  for  inor- 
dinate expenditure  upon  naval  armaments ;  and  the  Vol- 
unteers were  displaying  increased  activity  in  amateur 
soldiering,  in  view  of  a  possible  war  with  Germany,  —  an 
invasion  from  that  quarter,  and  a  "  Battle  of  Dorking." 
Mr.  Disraeli  led  the  Tory  Opposition ;  Mr.  Gladstone  was 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  345 

going  through  the  last  stages  of  his  conversion  from  a  Tory 
of  the  old  school  to  an  Advanced  Radical;  and  Ireland 
gave  less  trouble  to  the  Government  than  she  had  done  for 
many  years. 

On  April  2,  1865,  Mr.  Cobden,  the  standard-bearer 
twenty  years  before  of  the  great  Corn  Law  League,  and  the 
champion  of  working-men  in  the  manufacturing  districts, 
died,  and  on  October  18  of  the  same  year  died  Lord  Pal- 
merston.  Had  he  lived  two  days  longer,  he  would  have 
been  eighty-one.  His  mental  powers  were  unweakened  to 
the  last,  and  he  kept  up  his  physical  activity  to  within  a  few 
months  of  his  death,  when  gout  and  failing  eyesight  dis- 
abled him.  When  seventy  years  old  he  could  row  on  the 
Thames  before  breakfast,  or  swim  in  the  river  like  an  Eton 
boy ;  and  only  a  short  time  before  his  death  he  was  seen  to 
come  early  out  of  his  house,  and,  looking  round  to  see  he  was 
not  observed,  climb  over  a  high  iron  railing  to  test  his 
powers. 

The  grief  for  his  loss  was  national.  "  He  was  a  true 
Englishman,"  was  the  praise  on  everybody's  lips.  "The 
incarnation  of  le  petfide  Albion,"  a  French  writer  had  said 
of  him  a  quarter  of  a  century  before.  His  opponents  ex- 
pressed as  much  sorrow  for  his  loss  as  did  his  friends.  He 
was  buried  in  Westminster  Abbey,  and  most  truly  mourned 
for ;  yet  he  was  essentially  a  man  of  his  hour,  an  opportunist 
by  nature,  and  an  eminently  successful  one.  He  can  hardly 
be  said  to  have  left  "footprints  on  the  sands  of  time"  that 
the  advancing  ocean  has  not  been  able  to  wash  away.  Can- 
ning, Peel,  Melbourne,  Wellington,  and  Disraeli  had  stronger 
personalities,  and  will  live  longer  in  men's  memories  than 
Palmerston. 

He  was  the  last  of  the  confidential  advisers  with  whom 
Queen  Victoria  began  her  reign ;  and  a  recent  writer  in 
the  "  Nineteenth  Century  "  closes  a  brief  sketch  of  him  by 
saying :  — 

"Henceforth  the  Queen  was  destined  to  be  thrown  with  a 
new  generation  of  public  servants,  men  well  known  to  her  by 
name  and  fame,  but  none  of  whom  had  passed  in  close  relation 


346   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

with  her  through  the  excitements  of  her  queenship,  and  the  joys 
and  sorrows  of  her  married  life.  In  spite  of  differences,  the 
Queen  had  always  extended  to  Lord  Palmerston  that  straight- 
forward support,  of  the  lack  of  which  none  of  her  ministers  have 
ever  complained  ;  and  when  he  died,  she  could  not  help  feeling 
that  her  youth  had  passed  away  with  him,  and  that  she  was 
left,  a  lonely  woman,  face  to  face  with  the  awful  responsibilities 
of  her  great  office,  without  one  human  being  in  the  world  whom 
she  could  call  an  old  friend." 

The  vacancy  occasioned  in  the  cabinet  by  Lord  Palmer- 
ston's  death  was  supplied  by  Lord  John  Russell ;  but  as  he 
had  been  raised  to  the  peerage  as  an  English  peer  under 
the  title  of  Earl  Russell,  he  could  not,  like  Palmerston, 
who  was  only  an  Irish  peer,  sit  in  the  House  of  'Commons. 
Mr.  Gladstone,  therefore,  became  leader  for  Her  Majesty's 
Government  in  the  Lower  House,  while  Mr.  Disraeli  was 
the  leader  of  "Her  Majesty's  Opposition." 

In  1866  Lord  Russell  brought  forward  a  reformed  Reform 
Bill.  But  the  House  of  Commons  did  not,  as  a  whole, 
want  reform,  and  the  "unenfranchised  millions"  who  had 
agitated  for  the  Charter  in  1848  were  not  likely  to  be  much 
appeased  by  a  measure  which  would  extend  the  franchise  to 
only  a  few  hundreds. 

As  the  bill  never  passed,  no  more  need  be  said  of  it. 
Lord  Russell's  ministry  resigned,  and  the  ministry  of  Lord 
Derby  (father  of  the  future  statesman  of  our  own  day) 
came  into  power. 

Mr.  McCarthy  says  :  — 

"The  year  1866  was  a  year  of  great  agitation  throughout 
Europe  and  America.  In  England  a  great  commercial  crisis 
had  taken  place,  with  its  Black  Friday  of  May  n,  which  made 
a  most  disastrous  mark  upon  the  history  of  the  City  of  London. 
The  Bank  Charter  had  to  be  suspended.  The  cattle  plague, 
though  checked  by  the  stringent  measures  of  the  Government, 
was  still  raging,  and  the  landlords  and  cattle-owners  were  still  in 
a  state  of  excitement  and  alarm,  and  had  long  been  clamoring 
over  the  insufficiency  of  the  compensation  paid  by  the  Govern- 
ment for  the  cattle  they  were  compelled  to  slaughter,  while  other 
classes  condemned  it  as  extravagant  and  unreasonable.  The 
Emperor  of  Austria  drew  the  sword  against  Prussia.  Italy  en- 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  347 

tered  into  the  quarrel  by  declaring  war  against  Austria.  The 
time  seemed  hopeless  for  pressing  a  small  reform  bill  on  in  the 
face  of  an  unwilling  Parliament,  or  for  throwing  the  country 
into  the  turmoil  of  a  general  election.  Lord  Russell  and  Mr. 
Gladstone  accepted  the  situation,  and  resigned." 

In  the  ministry  of  Lord  Derby  that  succeeded  the  brief 
cabinet  of  Lord  Russell,  Mr.  Disraeli  was  prominent.  He 
was  a  man  whose  career  had  been  full  of  surprises.  He 
was  an  English  leader,  alien  from  Englishmen  both  in  race 
and  temperament ;  the  head  of  the  most  English  of  English 
parties,  though  his  ideas  and  his  character  were  essentially 
un-English ;  the  champion  of  the  Church,  though  of  Jewish 
race  and  birth  ;  an  ex- Radical  who  led  the  broken  wing  of 
the  extreme  Conservatives ;  an  orator  who  for  ten  sessions 
was  heard  in  Parliament  with  laughter  or  indifference ;  a 
man  whose  birthday  is  still  kept,  with  primrose  garlands,  by 
the  great  ladies  and  gentlemen  of  England ;  who  for  years 
was  the  butt  of  "  Punch,"  whose  dress,  manners,  ringlets, 
and  physiognomy  had  all  the  characteristics  of  that  flash 
vulgarity  which  is  supposed  to  mark  the  Jew. 

It  was  his  theory,  put  forth  in  all  his  novels,  that  Jews  are 
the  born  rulers  of  the  human  race ;  and  in  "  Sidonia  "  he 
certainly  seems  to  have  made  good  his  proposition.  As 
bankers,  physicians,  musicians,  singers,  rulers,  and  men  of 
literature,  he  advanced  their  claims  to  eminence  ;  and  un- 
doubtedly he  himself  was  a  striking  illustration  of  his  theory. 

In  the  days  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  his  ancestors  had 
been  driven  from  Spain  by  Torquemada  and  the  Inquisition. 
The  Spanish  Jews  have  always  maintained  that  their  ances- 
tors took  no  part  in  the  tragedy  of  the  Crucifixion  ;  that  the 
curse  that  day  invoked  by  Jews  on  their  posterity  should  not 
apply  to  them,  since  they  had  been  settled  in  Spain  long 
before  the  Christian  era. 

The  family  of  Lord  Beaconsfield  took  refuge  in  Venice. 
There  they  may  have  walked  with  Shylock  on  the  Rialto, 
and  lent  moneys  to  Bassanio  and  young  men  similarly 
extravagant.  It  is  certain  that  they  were  buried  in  the 
Jewish  burying-ground  beside  the  sea,  where  sunken 


348   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

stone  slabs  record  their  names,  half  covered  by  intruding 
vegetation. 

About  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  Mr.  Pelham, 
being  Prime  Minister  of  England,  endeavored  to  remove 
some  of  the  civil  disabilities  of  the  Jews,  who,  up  to  that 
time  (with  a  brief  intermission  during  the  rule  of  Cromwell), 
had  been  permitted  to  live  in  England  only  on  sufferance. 
Encouraged  by  this  new  disposition  in  their  favor,  some  Jews 
(among  them  the  grandfather  of  Lord  Beaconsfield)  came 
over  to  England  in  1749.  There  were  Jewish  families  of 
wealth  and  consideration  already  there,  and  in  more  than 
one  case  the  wealth  of  heiresses  had  caused  them  to  be  allied 
with  the  aristocracy. 

In  1753,  the  Jews'  Naturalization  Bill  was  passed;  but  it 
met  with  great  mob  opposition  (as  we  may  see  in  Miss 
Edgeworth's  charming  story  of  "  Harrington,")  and  as  soon 
as  Mr.  Pelham  was  dead  it  was  repealed.  The  Jews  remained 
foreigners  in  England  up  to  1858. 

The  immigrant  (Lord  Beaconsfield's  grandfather)  assumed 
the  name  of  D'Israeli,  —  a  name  never  borne  by  any  other 
Jewish  family,  —  "  in  order,"  says  his  grandson,  "  that  the 
race  from  whence  he  sprang  might  be  forever  recognized." 

The  wife  of  this  proudly  Jewish  gentleman  was  entirely 
unlike  himself.  She  was  of  a  highly  descended  Jewish  fam- 
ily, and  had  social  aspirations.  She  felt  deep  shame  and 
pain  at  being  a  Jewess,1  and  it  is  believed  that  she  refused 
to  follow  her  husband  to  England,  but  lived  and  died  apart 
from  him  in  Amsterdam.  Her  grandson  says  of  her  that 
she  was  so  mortified  by  her  social  position  "  that  she  lived 
till  eighty  without  indulging  a  tender  expression.  Her 
fierceness  of  resentment,  not  being  able  to  wreak  itself  upon 
her  nation's  persecutors,  preyed  upon  and  rent  herself.  She 
detested  her  own  race.  She  hated  the  name  of  D'Israeli, 
which  her  husband  had  given  her,  looking  upon  it  as  he 
looked  upon  it  (though  in  a  different  sense),  as  a  perpetual 
witness  of  their  Jewish  connections." 

1  She  is  said  to  have  been  the  original  of  the  Princess,  Daniel 
Deronda's  unnatural  mother. 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  349 

This  grandfather  his  descendant  describes  as  "  a  man  of 
ardent  character,  sanguine,  courageous,  speculative,  and  for- 
tunate ;  with  a  temper  which  no  disappointment  could  dis- 
turb, and  a  brain,  amid  reverses,  full  of  resource."  In 
short,  he  was  a  brilliant  man  of  business  and  an  accom- 
plished man  of  the  world.  He  made  his  fortune  and 
enjoyed  it ;  owned  land  in  three  counties  in  England ; 
built  himself  a  beautiful  country  seat,  where  he  laid  out 
an  Italian  garden ;  played  whist  with  Sir  Horace  Mann, 
the  friend  of  Horace  Walpole ;  and  was  greatly  esteemed 
by  his  contemporaries. 

His  son,  Isaac  Disraeli,  was  a  literary  man,  and  wrote 
books  still  on  the  shelves  of  our  libraries.  With  him,  a 
sense  of  social  exclusion  seems  to  have  led  to  his  shutting 
himself  up  with  his  books.  Benjamin  Disraeli,  his  eldest 
son,  born  in  1805,  was  twelve  years  old  when  the  old 
grandfather  died,  and  a  year  later  his  father,  having  had 
some  disagreement  with  the  rulers  of  the  chief  synagogue 
in  London,  broke  off  the  relations  of  his  family  with  their 
co-religionists.  Isaac  Disraeli  never  joined  any  religious 
body  afterwards,  but  his  friend  and  literary  associate,  Samuel 
Rogers,  the  banker  and  poet,  marched  the  boy  Benjamin 
off  to  St.  Andrew's  Church,  Holborn,  and  on  July  31,  1817, 
Benjamin  Disraeli,  "  said  to  be,"  says  the  "  Parish  Register," 
"  twelve  years  old,"  was  baptized  a  Church  of  England 
Christian.  It  is  not  likely  there  was  much,  if  any,  religious 
feeling  in  the  matter.  Samuel  Rogers  was  not  eminent  as 
a  Christian.  It  is  not  known  whether  Isaac  Disraeli  objected, 
or  gave  (as  is  probable)  a  tacit  consent ;  but  the  true  story 
seems  to  be  that  Rogers,  thinking  it  a  pity  that  the  lack  of 
a  mere  form,  as  he  considered  it,  should  stand  in  the  way 
of  a  very  clever  boy's  advancement,  took  this  mode  of 
inducting  him  into  all  the  privileges,  civil  and  political, 
which  the  law  of  England  then  denied  to  Jews,  Papists, 
and  Dissenters. 

Young  Disraeli  never  went  to  any  public  school,  but  was 
for  a  little  while  in  a  law  office.  From  the  first  he  intended 
to  reap  all  the  temporal  good  he  could  out  of  his  "  conver* 


350  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

sion."  He  tried  to  secure  a  seat  in  Parliament  as  soon  as 
he  was  of  the  legal  age,  and  was  greatly  annoyed  at  hearing 
that  Lord  Grey,  struck  by  his  unusual  name,  had  asked, 
"What  is  he?"  Thereupon  he  wrote  a  pamphlet  to 
answer  the  question.  The  pamphlet  is  lost.  It  is  not 
even  (more 's  the  pity)  in  the  British  Museum ;  but  it 
was  a  prophecy,  made  in  good  faith,  of  what  it  was  his 
intention  to  become.  Somebody,  in  after  years,  said  of 
it  that  it  was  like  a  scene  in  an  old  Miracle  Play,  in 
which  Adam  passes  before  the  audience  on  his  way  to  be 
created. 

Disraeli's  first  appearance  before  the  public  was  as  author 
of  a  very  clever  novel,  "  Vivian  Grey,"  written  before  he 
was  twenty-two.  "  The  book  was,"  says  Justin  McCarthy, 
"  suffused  with  extravagant  affectation  and  mere  animal 
spirits ;  but  it  was  full  of  the  evidence  of  a  fresh  and  bril- 
liant ability."  It  was  followed  by  "  Contarini  Fleming," 
and  then  by  the  "  Wondrous  Tale  of  Alroy."  All  these 
novels  were  written  at  white  heat,  and  are  full  of  personal 
feeling.  They  were  not  autobiographical  in  matter,  but 
entirely  so  in  their  reflections.  All  his  writings,  up  to  the 
day  of  his  death,  were  Oriental  rather  than  English,  and 
Oriental  in  everything  was  the  whole  turn  of  his  mind. 
There  are  few  things  more  amusing  than  a  celebrated  re- 
view in  "  Blackwood "  of  "  Lothair  ;  "  and  there  is  no 
better  parody  than  Bret  Harte's  "  Lothaw  "  in  "  Condensed 
Novels."  Nevertheless,  all  Disraeli's  novels  are  extremely 
interesting,  full  of  sparkling  thoughts,  and  things  that  sug- 
gest thought  to  the  reader.  He  wrote  novels  to  the  end  of 
his  life  ;  "  Endymion,"  his  last,  being  very  autobiographical, 
and  full  of  sketches  of  the  statesmen  of  his  time. 

He  entered  Parliament  for  Maidstone,  in  Kent,  in  1837, 
being  then  thirty-two  years  of  age.  He  began  his  career 
as  an  advanced  Radical,  a  supporter  of  O'Connell,  a  dis- 
ciple of  Joseph  Hume.  Subsequently  he  quarrelled  with 
O'Connell ;  but  that  was  years  later,  when  he  was  a  Tory 
leader,  and  O'Connell  called  him,  in  the  polite  language 
of  political  controversy  in  those  days,  "a  miscreant,"  "a 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  351 

wretch,"  "  a  liar  whose  whole  life  is  a  living  lie,"  and, 
finally,  "  the  blasphemous  descendant  of  the  impenitent 
thief."  Disraeli  was  not  slow  to  return  these  compliments, 
particularly  offensive  in  the  mouth  of  a  man  who,  it  was 
known,  would  fight  no  duel. 

Disraeli's  first  speech  provoked  the  laughter  and  the 
ridicule  of  the  House  of  Commons.  The  only  man  who 
saw  anything  in  it  was  the  future  sufferer  from  his  impas- 
sioned, bitter  eloquence,  —  Sir  Robert  Peel.  At  last,  baffled 
by  persistent  laughter  and  other  interruptions  of  a  noisy 
House,  Disraeli  lost  his  temper,  which  for  a  long  time  he 
had  kept  wonderfully  under  control,  and,  pausing  in  the 
middle  of  a  sentence,  he  looked  full  in  the  faces  of  his 
opponents,  and  then,  raising  his  hands  and  opening  his 
mouth  as  wide  as  its  dimensions  would  permit,  he  said 
very  loudly,  and  in  an  almost  terrific  tone  :  "  I  have  begun 
several  times  many  things,  and  I  have  often  succeeded  at 
last ;  aye,  sir,  and  though  I  sit  down  now,  the  time  will 
come  when  you  will  hear  me  !  " 

For  ten  years  he  continued  to  sit  in  Parliament,  taking 
frequent  part  in  debates,  and  appreciated  as  a  good  free 
lance,  though  no  one  but  himself  dreamed  of  him  as  a 
political  leader. 

He  is  described  by  one  who  -used  to  see  him  in  those 
days  as  — 

"Attired  in  a  bottle-green  coat,  a  white  waistcoat  of  the  Dick 
Sniveller  pattern,  the  front  of  which  exhibited  a  network  of 
glittering  chains,  large  fancy  pattern  pantaloons,  and  a  black 
tie,  over  which  appeared  no  shirt  collar.  His  countenance 
was  lividly  pale,  set  off  by  a  pair  of  intensely  black  eyes,  and  a 
broad  but  not  very  high  forehead,  overhung  by  clustering  ring- 
lets of  coal-black  hair,  which,  combed  away  from  the  right 
temple,  fell  in  bunches  of  well-oiled  small  ringlets  on  his  left 
cheek.  His  manner  was  intensely  theatrical,  his  gestures  were 
wild  and  extravagant." 

Mr.  Motley,  in  his  correspondence,  gives  this  account  of  his 
first  appearance  in  London  society,  as  the  author  of  "  Vivian 
Grey,' '  given  to  him  at  a  dinner-party  by  Mrs.  Norton : 


352    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  She  assured  me  she  did  not  exaggerate.  He  wore  a  black 
velvet  coat  lined  with  satin ;  purple  trousers  with  a  gold  band 
running  down  the  outside  seam  ;  a  scarlet  waistcoat  ;  long  lace 
ruffles  falling  down  to  the  tips  of  his  fingers  ;  white  gloves,  with 
several  brilliant  rings  outside  of  them  ;  and  long  black  ringlets 
rippling  down  upon  his  shoulders." 

He  had  begun  life  a  young  and  ardent  spirit,  prepared 
to  run  amuck  against  all  old  existing  institutions.  In 
1846,  nine  years  after  he  entered  Parliament,  he  was  a 
strong  Conservative,  the  intimate  friend  and  associate  of 
Lord  George  Bentinck,  a  nobleman  who  up  to  that  time 
had  been  known  only  for  his  attachment  to  horse-racing 
and  his  upright  character. 

At  the  opening  of  the  session  of  1846,  Sir  Robert  Peel, 
then  Prime  Minister,  the  leader  of  the  Tory,  or  country, 
party,  electrified  all  parties  by  proclaiming  himself  a  con- 
vert to  the  principles  of  the  Anti-Corn  Law  League  and 
Mr.  Cobden.  English  wheat  was  no  longer  to  be  pro- 
tected ;  foreign  wheat-growers  were  to  be  invited  to  assist 
in  feeding  the  English  population.  With  us  it  is  the  manu- 
facturers who  are  supposed  to  want  a  tariff,  and  the  farmers 
who  desire  to  dispense  with  it.  In  England  it  was  the 
reverse. 

Sir  Robert  Peel's  declaration  of  a  change  of  policy  so 
paralyzed  his  party  that  it  is  possible  all  would  have  ac- 
quiesced in  his  new  views,  and  have  followed  him,  had  not 
Disraeli  sprung  to  his  feet  and  proclaimed  himself  the 
leader  of  all  those  who  desired  to  bolt  from  Sir  Robert's 
old  party.  With  the  most  stinging  sarcasm  he  pursued  the 
great  leader.  Every  word  of  his  speech  told.  From  that 
moment  he  was  a  power  in  the  state,  and  he  and  Lord 
George  Bentinck,  a  man  of  far  less  ability  than  himself, 
led  the  ranks  of  the  old-fashioned  High  Tories. 

Before  this  time  Disraeli  and  Lord  George  had  been 
prominent  in  a  movement  called  Young  England.  The 
Young  England  party  has  long  died  out ;  but  though  during 
its  existence  it  was  greatly  ridiculed,  it  left  behind  it  a  large 
residuum  of  good.  Its  idea  was  that  the  salvation  of 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  353 

England  lay  in  its  young  men  of  rank  and  cultivation, 
helped  by  its  young  women ;  that  above  all  things,  a  fusion 
of  classes  was  needed  :  the  high  and  the  low  must  know 
each  other,  and  meet  on  common  ground,  in  the  cricket- 
field,  in  the  dance,  in  lecture-rooms,  at  concerts,  and  in 
the  church  above  everything.  The  apostles  of  this  doc- 
trine were  to  be  the  highest.  Young  noblemen  and  clergy- 
men were  to  set  the  example,  just  as  officers  lead  soldiers. 
They  were  to  acquire  influence,  practise  loving-kindness, 
introduce  culture  to  the  masses,  take  the  lead  in  sanitary 
and  social  reforms.  A  vast  deal  has  been  done  in  England 
in  these  respects  which  was  set  going  by  Young  England. 
The  political  principles  of  the  party  were  in  the  highest 
degree  opposed  to  radicalism  ;  but,  socially,  the  young  noble- 
man was  taught  to  consider  himself  the  man  and  the  brother 
of  his  ploughboy  or  the  artisan. 

Mr.  Disraeli  had  always  a  considerable  toleration  for 
misguided  Chartists,  revolutionaries,  and  even  Fenians, 
speaking  of  their  leaders  in  Parliament  with  more  pity  than 
reprobation.  In  " Coningsby,"  "Sybil,"  and  "Lothair" 
we  may  trace  his  feelings. 

He  was  above  all  things  an  opportunist.  He  thought 
that  as  times  grow,  so  men's  views  should  grow  with  them. 
Gambetta,  the  great  opportunist,  was  his  ardent  admirer. 

In  a  series  of  intensely  bitter  articles  against  him  which 
came  out  in  the  "  Fortnightly  Review  "  two  years  before  his 
death,  his  career  is  divided  into  three  epochs,  —  from  1826 
to  1837,  the  era  of  preparation;  from  1837  to  1852,  the 
era  of  struggle,  when  in  Parliament  he  tried  to  gain,  first 
toleration,  then  recognition,  and  then  eminence ;  and  from 
1852  to  1878,  when  he  stood  victorious  and  triumphant, 
acknowledged  at  last  to  be  the  greatest  man  in  England 
of  his  day. 

The  unfriendly  critic  says  of  him  in  the  middle  stage 
of  his  career  (that  is,  from  1837  to  1852)  that  "he  began 
by  wearing  the  livery  of  Peel ;  then,  with  ribbons  in  his  hat 
and  a  whistle  in  his  mouth,  masqueraded  as  a  rural  swain, 
dancing  with  his  Young  England  companions  round  a  May- 

23 


354   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

pole ;  and  finally,  in  the  breeches  and  topboots  of  a  stage 
squire,  he  smacked  his  hunting-whip  against  his  thigh,  and 
denounced  the  villany  of  the  traitor  Peel,  who  had  deceived 
him  and  other  simple-minded  country  gentlemen  into 
believing  that  he  was  a  protectionist  and  a  friend  of  the 
land  and  the  corn  laws,  while  he  was  nothing  but  a 
manufacturer  and  a  free-trader.  Lord  Beaconsfield's  rapid 
changes  of  costume  and  character  resemble  those  of  the 
elder  and  younger  Mathews  in  some  of  their  most  start- 
ling transformations." 

It  is  quite  true  that  when  Disraeli  stood  for  Maidstone, 
in  1837,  he  had  modified  his  early  radicalism,  and  became 
for  a  short  time  an  enthusiastic  admirer  of  Peel.  In  1832 
he  had  sought  election  at  High  Wycombe  as  an  advanced 
Radical ;  he  came  into  Parliament  five  years  later  as  a  Con- 
servative. While  a  follower  of  Sir  Robert  Peel,  this  is  how 
he  addressed  his  leader  in  a  pamphlet  called  "  Letters  of 
Runnymede  "  :  "  In  the  halls  and  bowers  of  Drayton,  those 
gardens  and  that  library,  you  have  realized  the  romance  of 
Verulam,  and  enjoy  the  lettered  ease  that  Temple  loved." 
He  speaks  of  Sir  Robert's  "  splendid  talents  and  his  spot- 
less character,"  and  calls  him  the  Knight  of  Rhodes  in 
Schiller's  ballad,  —  "  the  only  hope  of  a  suffering  isle." 

Benjamin  Disraeli  came  into  Parliament,  as  I  have  said, 
for  Maidstone,  a  Kentish  borough,  in  1837.  Maidstone 
sent  two  representatives  to  Parliament.  The  colleague  of 
Mr.  Disraeli  was  Mr.  Wyndham  Lewis.  This  gentleman 
had  married  the  daughter  of  Captain  Viney,  of  the  English 
navy,  who  was  in  straitened  circumstances  at  her  father's 
death,  but  who,  by  the  death  of  an  uncle,  had  become  an 
heiress  by  the  time  Mr.  Lewis  married  her.  This  lady  was 
sixteen  years  older  than  Disraeli.  A  year  after  Mr.  Lewis 
entered  Parliament  he  died  of  lung-trouble,  leaving  his  wife 
widowed  after  a  union  of  twenty-three  years.  Mrs.  Lewis 
went  into  strict  retirement  for  a  year ;  at  the  end  of  that 
time  she  married  Mr.  Disraeli.  It  was  a  perfectly  happy 
union,  though  it  proved  childless.  "  She  was,"  says  her 
husband,  "  the  most  severe  of  critics,  but  a  perfect  wife." 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  355 

The  love  and  confidence  each  had  for  the  other  grew 
greater  and  greater  as  the  years  rolled  on. 

"  Few  were  admitted,"  says  a  friend,  "  to  the  privilege 
of  intimacy  with  them,  and  they  only  had  the  faintest  idea 
of  the  perfect  affection  and  confidence  existing  between 
them,  —  of  the  chivalrous  devotion  of  the  author- statesman 
to  his  somewhat  elderly  wife,  of  the  wife's  utter  and  absorbing 
affection  for  her  distinguished  husband." 

Some  ten  years  after  his  marriage,  when  Disraeli  was  to 
make  a  great  speech  in  the  House  of  Commons,  his  wife 
drove  down  with  him  to  Westminster.  "On  getting  into 
the  carriage,  one  of  her  fingers  was  crushed  between  the 
door  and  its  frame.  The  pain  must  have  been  terrible  ;  but 
she  said  not  a  word,  and  maintained  her  composure  till  her 
husband  had  left  her  to  go  in  by  the  Members'  entrance, 
when,  as  he  disappeared  through  the  doorway,  she  fainted 
away." 

I  may  as  well  tell  a  few  anecdotes  concerning  this  lady 
here,  and  then  proceed  with  her  husband's  history.  Lord 
Beaconsfield's  enemies  accused  him  of  boyish  freaks  in  lit- 
erature, oratory,  and  statesmanship.  He  must  have  had  a 
great  deal  of  the  boy  about  him,  to  which  his  wife's  nature, 
even  in  old  age,  seems  to  have  responded ;  there  was  an 
unusual  fund  of  gayety  in  both  their  natures.  "  The  hus- 
band never  indulged  in  unavailing  regrets.  He  never 
suffered  blunders  or  misfortunes  or  miscarriages  to  touch 
him  over-keenly.  When  in  Edinburgh,  in  1867,  he  had  a 
great  enthusiastic  reception  which  delighted  him,  '  We 
did  not  go  to  bed  till  very  late,'  he  said  to  a  friend  the  next 
morning.  '  Mrs.  Disraeli  and  I  were  so  delighted  that  we 
danced  a  jig  over  it  in  our  bedchamber.'  "  Mrs.  Disraeli 
was  then  seventy-seven,  and  her  husband  sixty-two. 

A  year  later  (1868),  she  was  created  Countess  of  Beacons- 
field  in  her  own  right  by  the  Queen,  —  an  honor  which 
took  them  both  by  surprise.  The  husband,  it  was  well 
known,  did  not  wish  to  be  raised  to  the  peerage,  as  he 
would  thereby  become  ineligible  to  sit  in  the  Lower 
House. 


356   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Lady  Beaconsfield  lived  till  1872,  and  was  eighty-two 
years  old.  Her  husband,  who  survived  her  nine  years,  never 
recovered  her  loss. 

The  year  of  her  death,  when  she  knew  that  the  disease  of 
which  she  must  die  in  a  few  months  was  making  progress, 
she  endeavored  to  hide  her  situation  from  her  husband; 
whilst  he  on  his  part  endeavored  so  to  act  that  she  should 
not  suspect  his  knowledge  of  the  same  thing. 

"  He  made  a  great  non-political  speech  at  the  opening  of  a 
popular  exhibition  in  Manchester,  in  1871.  Lady  Beaconsfield 
was  present,  and  towards  her  her  husband  frequently  turned  his 
head.  When  it  was  over  she  was  driven  to  the  house  of  a  friend. 
There,  when  she  heard  the  grating  of  his  wheels  upon  the  gravel, 
she  hurried  to  the  door  to  meet  him,  though  every  movement 
was  pain,  and,  flinging  herself  into  his  arms,  embraced  him 
rapturously,  crying,  '  Oh,  Dizzy,  Dizzy,  this  is  the  greatest  night 
of  all !  this  pays  for  everything  ! '  " 

We  turn  back  now  to  1846,  when  Disraeli  sprang  at  a 
bound  into  the  position  of  a  statesman  and  the  leader  of  a 
party,  by  his  speech  against  Sir  Robert  Peel.  His  invec- 
tives against  the  man  he  had  once  worshipped  were  fright- 
fully bitter ;  but  then  he  treated  Lord  Palmerston  and  Lord 
John  Russell  in  the  same  way. 

Palmerston  and  Lord  John  probably  cared  little  for  his 
attacks ;  but  Sir  Robert  felt  them  keenly,  though  he  sat  all 
through  them  with  patient  dignity. 

As  we  have  seen,  Peel  carried  his  repeal  of  the  Corn 
Laws,  and  then  was  forced  to  resign  by  defeat  on  an  Irish 
coercion  bill,  through  a  coalition  of  the  Whigs  with  those 
who,  under  Lord  George  Bentinck  and  Mr.  Disraeli,  had 
bolted  from  the  Tory  party.  The  Whigs,  under  Lord  John 
Russell,  succeeded  Sir  Robert  Peel. 

In  1852,  the  party  of  Mr.  Disraeli  was  in  power,  and  he 
was  a  member  of  the  cabinet.  Lord  George  Bentinck  had 
died  a  sudden  death  four  years  before,  and  Lord  Derby 
was  Prime  Minister.  Mr.  Disraeli  was  Chancellor  of  the 
Exchequer  (what  in  the  United  States  is  Secretary  of  the 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  357 

Treasury),  and  he  was  also  his  party's  leader  in  the  House 
of  Commons.  He  asked  for  this  office  in  preference  to 
being  made  one  of  the  secretaries  of  state,  as  was  at  first 
proposed ;  it  was  surmised,  because  the  office  of  secretary 
would  have  brought  him  into  personal  relations  with  the 
Queen,  —  an  association  he  had  reason  to  think  would  not 
be  agreeable  to  her.  Twenty  years  later,  the  Queen  was 
accused  of  an  esteem  for  him  which  tended  to  favoritism ; 
but  in  1852  Her  Majesty  was  not  known  to  her  people  as 
she  is  now;  and,  in  1841,  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  who 
loved  her  like  an  uncle,  could  say,  "  There  will  never  be  a 
Conservative  ministry,  —  I  have  no  small  talk,  and  Peel  has 
no  manners." 

It  fell  to  Mr.  Disraeli,  in  his  official  position,  to  make  two 
motions  in  the  House  of  Commons  in  one  day,  —  one  an- 
nouncing that  Her  Majesty's  Government  recognized  Napo- 
leon III.  as  Emperor  of  the  French  ;  the  other  asking  for  a 
vote  of  money  to  defray  the  expenses  of  the  public  funeral 
of  the  Duke  of  Wellington. 

It  became  his  duty,  too,  as  representative  of  the  Govern- 
ment, to  pronounce  the  eulogy  of  the  greatest  of  modern 
Englishmen  in  Parliament.  The  speech  was  a  brilliant  one  ; 
but  it  is  not  denied,  even  by  his  friends,  that  some  one  dis- 
covered presently  that  it  was  a  plagiarism  from  an  oration 
by  M.  Thiers  over  one  of  Napoleon's  marshals  ! 

As  a  leader  of  the  House  of  Commons,  Disraeli  was  an 
indefatigable  and  painstaking  worker;  but  he  did  not 
distinguish  himself  as  a  financier.  His  party  was  not  long 
in  office,  and  six  years  succeeded,  during  which  Lord 
Aberdeen  and  Mr.  Gladstone  first,  and  afterwards  Lord 
Palmerston  and  a  Whig  cabinet  were  in  power.  During 
these  six  years  occurred  the  Crimean  war,  the  Indian 
Mutiny,  and  the  establishment  of  a  friendly  alliance 
between  France  and  England. 

When  the  bombs  of  Orsini  threw  Lord  Palmerston  and 
his  cabinet  out  of  power,  Lord  Derby  and  Mr.  Disraeli 
resumed  office.  Under  them  the  East  India  Company  as 
a  ruling  body  was  broken  up,  and  the  Government  of  India 
transferred  to  the  English  Crown. 


358   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

A  revision  of  the  Reform  Bill  was  called  for  in  1867. 
Reform  bills  had  been  brought  forward  in  1851,  1854, 
1860,  1861,  and  1867.  "All  parties,"  as  Disraeli  said, 
"  seemed  to  have  tried  to  reform  the  Reform  Bill,  but  had 
failed."  All  appear  to  have  agreed  on  the  necessity  of  a 
more  liberal  franchise.  Lord  Derby's  Government  pre- 
pared such  a  bill ;  but  before  it  could  be  passed  they  had 
to  give  up  office,  and  the  Whigs,  coming  in,  picked  up  the 
bill  and  made  it  a  Government  measure. 

It  was  on  this  occasion  or  a  similar  one  that  Mr. 
Disraeli  said  "  that  the  Whigs  had  caught  the  Tories  bath- 
ing, and  had  tried  to  steal  their  clothes." 

There  were  heated  political  discussions  in  those  days, 
and  brief  tenure  of  office  for  either  party.  Throughout  all 
this  time  our  Civil  War  was  raging,  and  England  hesitated 
which  side  to  take,  as  now  Conservatives  and  now  Liberals 
came  into  power.  Mr.  Gladstone  sympathized  with  the 
Southern  people  ;  Mr.  Disraeli  believed  that  the  great  future 
of  America  lay  in  the  continued  Union  of  North  and  South. 
Early  in  1868,  Disraeli  became  Prime  Minister,  Lord 
Derby  having  retired  from  office  after  passing  a  Reform 
Bill.  But  Disraeli  did  not  retain  his  premiership  very 
long.  His  rival  and  political  opponent,  Mr.  Gladstone, 
carried  a  resolution  in  regard  to  the  Disestablishment  of  the 
Anglican  Church  in  Ireland.  Disraeli  appealed  to  the 
country,  and  the  result  was  a  complete  defeat  of  his 
party  in  a  General  Election. 

However  much  or  little  of  a  Christian  Disraeli  may  have 
been,  his  policy  was  always  in  sympathy  with  the  High 
Church  party ;  but  many  members  of  that  party  held,  with 
Keble,  that  to  endow  the  Established  Church  in  Ireland 
with  the  spoils  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  was  an  injus- 
tice. The  disestablishment  of  the  Church  in  Ireland  stands 
on  a  very  different  footing  from  disestablishment  in  Wales 
or  England. 

When  Disraeli  found  himself  defeated  in  1868  in  the  Gen- 
eral Election,  he  bowed  to  the  decision  of  his  country,  and 
placed  the  reins  of  government  in  Mr.  Gladstone's  hands. 
That  statesman  held  office  for  six  years,  and  in  1874 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  359 

Disraeli  and  his  party  came  back  to  power.  The  present 
Lord  Salisbury  was  one  of  the  cabinet. 

And  now  Lord  Beaconsfield  (for  in  1876  Disraeli  had 
accepted  the  same  title  as  his  wife)  was  at  the  height  of  his 
political  prosperity.  He  had  the  favor  and  personal  affec- 
tion of  the  Queen,  and  the  full  support  of  Parliament. 
Since  the  fall  of  Sir  Robert  Peel's  ministry,  in  1846,  no 
administration  had  enjoyed  such  advantages.  He  himself, 
having  no  longer  the  leadership  of  the  House  of  Commons 
to  attend  to,  devoted  himself  largely  to  foreign  affairs.  He 
wanted  to  deal  with  kings  and  emperors,  and  to  maintain 
the  balance  of  power. 

In  1875  the  risings  in  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  the  war 
between  Turkey  and  Servia,  and  the  Bulgarian  massacres, 
had  reopened  the  Eastern  Question  ;  and  Lord  Beacons- 
field  was  delighted,  Oriental  as  he  was  in  temperament, 
to  have  to  do  with  the  East.  In  nearly  all  his  novels  his 
hero  goes  to  the  East  to  work  reforms  and  to  complete  his 
glory.  "  Let  the  Queen  of  England,"  cries  his  favorite 
hero,  in  one  of  his  early  novels,  "  collect  a  great  fleet,  let 
her  stow  away  all  her  treasures,  —  bullion,  gold  plate,  and 
precious  arms,  —  be  accompanied  by  her  court  and  her 
chief  people,  and  transfer  the  seat  of  her  Empire  from 
London  to  Delhi ;  there  she  will  find  an  immense  em- 
pire ready  made,  a  first-rate  army,  and  a  large  revenue. 
We  acknowledge  the  Empress  of  India  as  our  suzerain,  and 
secure  for  her  the  Levantine  coast.  If  she  likes,  she  shall 
have  Alexandria,  as  she  now  has  Malta.  You  see  it  would 
be  the  greatest  empire  that  ever  existed ;  and  the  only  dif- 
ficult part,  the  conquest  of  India,  which  baffled  Alexander, 
has  been  done." 

This  speech  in  Lord  Beaconsfield's  novel  of  "  Tancred," 
written  almost  in  the  days  of  his  youth,  he  set  himself, 
when  he  was  Prime  Minister  of  England,  in  some  part  to 
accomplish.  True,  Queen  Victoria  did  not  carry  out  the 
Indian  Emir's  idea  that  her  capital  had  better  be  trans- 
ferred to  Delhi,  but  all  the  rest  of  it  has  become  nearly 
true.  The  Queen  is  Empress  of  India;  England  owns 


360   ENGLAND  IN  THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Cyprus,  and  has  exercised  a  protectorate  over  the  Levan- 
tine provinces  of  Turkey ;  her  position  in  Egypt  may  be 
said  to  give  her  authority  in  Alexandria  ;  and  Indian  troops 
have  been  landed  at  Suakim  to  fight  the  Arabs  for  imperial 
ends. 

Oriental  himself,  the  Orient  was  the  field  of  aspirations 
for  Lord  Beaconsfield.  He  began  by  buying  nearly  one- 
half  of  all  the  shares  jn  the  Suez  Canal  from  the  impe- 
cunious Khedive,  to  whom  he  paid  nearly  ^4,000,000. 
When  the  canal  was  contemplated,  England,  to  speak  both 
literally  and  metaphorically,  had  taken  no  stock  in  the 
enterprise ;  she  would  not  patronize  its  opening.  Lord 
Palmerston  was  as  incredulous  of  its  success  as  Dr.  Lardner 
had  been  about  crossing  the  ocean  by  steam.  English 
engineers  were  supposed  to  have  demonstrated  that  the 
water-level  of  the  Red  Sea  was  higher  than  that  of  the 
Mediterranean.  But  the  canal  was  a  success ;  it  was 
the  high-road  to  India;  and  all  England  applauded  Lord 
Beaconsfield's  purchase  in  1875,  little  knowing  that  in  1881 
it  was  to  lead  their  country  into  Egyptian  difficulties. 

The  Queen  assumed  her  new  title  of  Empress  of  India 
in  1877  ;  and  this  all  England  did  not  applaud.  It  seemed 
to  Englishmen  that  the  title  of  Queen  of  England  was  the 
highest  upon  earth  ;  that  of  Empress  was  vulgar  frippery. 
Besides,  the  title  had  been  debased  under  Napoleon  III., 
and  poor  Maximilian  had  died  Emperor  of  Mexico ;  there 
had  been  an  Emperor  of  Hayti,  with  his  noble  court  of 
Dukes  of  Lemonade  and  Marmalade,  and  an  Emperor  of 
Morocco.  But  Disraeli's  ideas  were  all  imperial.  Imperial, 
he  said,  meant  ruling  over  many  states,  and  Her  Majesty 
held  imperial  sway  over  the  British  Empire.  The  title,  too, 
would  settle  certain  vexed  questions  of  court  etiquette,  and 
on  that  account  would  be  agreeable  to  Her  Majesty.  It 
has  proved,  indeed,  valuable  in  the  administration  of  the 
affairs  of  India,  —  the  native  princes  and  the  native  peoples 
understanding  the  personal  government  of  an  Empress  far 
better  than  that  of  cabinets  or  a  company.  The  Queen 
did  not  give  up  her  proudest  of  all  titles,  that  of  Queen  of 


LOKD   BEACONSFIELD. 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  361 

England,  but  she  added  to  it  Empress  of  India,  and  now 
signs  herself  Victoria  R.  and  I.  About  the  same  time  the 
Prince  of  Wales  made  his  Indian  tour,  and  it  was  thought 
had  roused  a  strong  feeling  of  loyalty  among  the  Indian 
populations.  In  one  district  in  India  the  people  set  up 
the  new  Empress  as  a  goddess,  and  Government  had 
sternly  to  interfere  to  put  such  worship  down. 

But  the  great  event  which  connected  Lord  Beaconsfield 
with  the  Orient  was  the  reopening  of  the  Eastern  Question. 
Elsewhere1  I  have  told  of  the  Turkish  war  of  1877,  of  the 
chivalrous  General  Skobeleff,  and  his  disappointment  at 
the  course  of  European  diplomacy.  We  must  see  what 
that  diplomacy  was.  Many  persons  have  accounted  it  not 
a  creditable  passage  in  English  history. 

The  Treaty  of  Paris,  made  after  the  Crimean  war,  pro- 
vided that  reforms  should  be  introduced  into  Turkey,  and 
that  civil  rights  should  be  granted  to  Christians.  The  Porte 
has  always  been  celebrated  for  its  "  masterly  inactivity ; " 
for  smiling  promises  and  scant  performances.  Abdul  Aziz, 
the  Sultan  in  1876,  if  not  actually  crazy,  was  certainly  not 
of  sound  mind.  He  spent  untold  sums  on  gardens  and  on 
architecture  ;  and  immense  sums  on  his  European  tour  in 
1867.  He  was  the  first  Turkish  sovereign  who  discovered 
the  convenience  of  raising  foreign  loans.  The  money  that 
he  got  by  this  means  was  spent  in  all  sorts  of  extravagant 
foolishness,  and  then  his  unfortunate  subjects  were  oppressed 
by  heavier  taxes.  This  caused  disturbances  in  Bosnia  and 
Herzegovina.  Servia  (an  autonomous  principality,  owing 
tribute  and  fealty  to  Turkey)  sympathized  with  oppressed 
fellow-Christians,  and  made  war  on  Turkey.  She  was  joined 
by  a  crowd  of  Russian  officers ;  but  the  Turks,  who  were 
splendid  fighters,  got  the  advantage.  In  1876  Bulgaria  be- 
gan to  be  restless.  The  Turkish  Government  sent  Circassians 
and  Bashi-Bazouks,  a  semi-organized  banditti,  to  keep  down 
insurrection.  These  fell  upon  the  wretched  villages  of  un- 
armed Christians.  Nor  was  massacre  confined  to  villages. 
In  Salonika  (Thessalonica)  the  French  and  German  consuls 

1  Russia  and  Turkey  in  the  Nineteenth  Century. 


362    ENGLAND  fJV  THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

were  murdered,  and  the  streets  ran  with  Christian  blood. 
"  These  massacres,"  says  Mr.  McCarthy,  "  hardly  found  their 
parallel  in  the  worst  days  of  the  Byzantine  Empire  or  under 
the  odious  rule  of  the  later  sovereigns  of  Delhi." 

England  was  roused  to  frenzy,  and  great  as  Lord  Beacons- 
field's  popularity  was,  he  impaired  it  by  making  light  of  the 
whole  matter.  Indeed,  his  ideas  seem  to  have  been  very 
vague  as  to  the  Turkish  provinces.  He  did  not  apparently 
know  exactly  what  were  Bashi- Bazouks. 

Soon,  however,  the  truth  was  known,  and  it  was  worse 
than  the  first  reports,  when  they  came  to  be  authenticated. 
It  is  true  that  the  atrocities  were  confined  to  what  is  now 
called  Eastern  Roumelia,  and  did  not  extend  north  of  the 
Balkans ;  but  within  that  province  there  had  been  wholesale 
torture,  massacre,  outrages  on  women,  and  sale  of  children 
into  slavery. 

An  agent,  Mr.  Baring,  was  sent  from  England  to  learn  the 
truth.  He  wrote  home  (and  subsequent  investigations  did 
but  confirm  his  first  impressions),  "Till  I  have  visited  the 
villages  I  can  hardly  speak  ;  but  my  present  opinion,  which  I 
trust  hereafter  to  be  able  to  modify,  is,  that  about  twelve 
thousand  Bulgarians  have  perished.  Sixty  villages  have  been 
wholly  or  partially  burned,  by  far  the  greater  portion  of  them 
by  Bashi- Bazouks."  Subsequently  Mr.  Baring  and  Mr.  Mac- 
gahan,  correspondent  of  the  "  Daily  News,"  saw  masses  of  the 
dead  bodies  of  women  and  children  piled  together  where  no 
fighting  had  taken  place  ;  they  had  been  simply  butchered. 

The  wrath  of  the  English  people  burst  into  a  flame.  Mr. 
Gladstone  headed  the  popular  feeling.  In  this  he  again 
pitted  himself  against  his  rival.  The  English  Government 
made  remonstrances  with  the  Turkish  Government,  and  was 
satisfied  when  assured  that  the  Bashi-Bazouks  should  be 
restrained,  while  at  that  very  moment  they  were  receiving 
rewards. 

But  after  a  little  while  —  a  brief  space  given  to  righteous 
indignation  —  Mr.  Disraeli  trumped  his  rival's  trick  by  rous- 
ing a  feeling  it  is  always  easy  to  rouse  in  England,  —  antag- 
onism to  Russia. 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  363 

Russia,  indignant  that  nothing  effectual  had  been  done  by 
the  united  efforts  of  the  Great  Powers  of  Europe,  declared 
that,  whether  the  Treaty  of  Paris  allowed  it  or  not,  she  was 
going  to  act  by  herself,  —  punish  the  Turks,  and  defend  the 
Christians.  Then  public  opinion  changed  :  "  Mr.  Gladstone 
was  honestly  regarded  by  millions  of  Englishmen  as  the 
friend  and  instrument  of  Russia ;  Disraeli  as  the  champion 
of  England,  and  the  enemy  of  England's  enemy." 

On  August  ii,  1876,  Mr.  Disraeli  made  his  last  speech 
(a  very  powerful  one)  in  the  House  of  Commons.  "The 
next  morning  all  England  knew,  what  no  creature  had  sus- 
pected the  night  before,  that  Mr.  Disraeli  had  relinquished 
his  career  as  the  great  Commoner,  and  had  consented  to 
pass  into  the  House  of  Lords  as  Lord  Beaconsfield." 

Lord  Beaconsfield  was  for  maintaining  Turkey,  at  all 
risks,  as  a  barrier  against  Russia;  Mr.  Gladstone  was  for 
renouncing  all  responsibility  for  Turkey,  and  taking  the 
consequences. 

Meantime,  while  diplomacy  went  on,  and  feelings  in  Eng- 
land were  at  boiling  heat,  the  Turkish  war  began.  The  Rus- 
sians crossed  the  Danube  June  27,  1877,  and  found  the  Turks 
a  much  harder  enemy  to  conquer  than  they  had  expected. 
They  were  three  times  repulsed  at  Plevna ;  took  it  at  last, 
not  by  fighting,  but  by  famine  ;  crossed  the  Balkans  in  mid- 
winter, at  the  cost  of  dreadful  suffering  ;  took  Adrianople, 
and  encamped  upon  the  shores  of  the  Sea  of  Marmora. 

All  this  time  there  was  a  strong  feeling  among  Lord 
Beaconfield's  supporters  that  there  would  be  —  and  there 
must  be  —  a  war  between  England  and  Russia.  Then 
Lord  Beaconsfield's  followers  began  to  be  called  Jingoes, 
and  his  policy  Jingoism.  Mr.  McCarthy  shall  tell  us  how 
they  got  that  singular  name. 

"  There  was  a  very  large  and  a  very  noisy  war  party  already  in 
existence.  It  was  particularly  strong  in  London.  It  embraced 
some  Liberals  as  well  as  some  Tories.  It  was  popular  in  the 
music-halls  and  in  the  public  places  of  London.  The  class 
whom  Prince  Bismarck  once  called  'gentlemen  of  the  pave- 
ment '  were  in  its  favor.  The  men  of  action  got  a  nickname. 


364   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

They  were  dubbed  the  Jingo  Party.  The  term,  applied  in  ridi- 
cule and  reproach,  was  adopted  by  chivalrous  Jingoes  as  a  name 
of  pride.  Some  Tyrtaeus  of  the  taproom,  some  Korner  of  the 
music-halls,  had  composed  a  ballad  which  was  sung  at  one 
of  these  caves  of  harmony  every  night  amid  tumultuous 
applause.  The  refrain  of  this  war-song  contained  the  spirit- 
stirring  words :  — 

" '  We  don't  want  to  fight ;  but,  by  Jingo  !  if  we  do, 

We  've  got  the  ships,  we  've  got  the  men,  we  've  got  the  money  too.' 

Some  one  whose  pulses  this  lyrical  outburst  had  failed  to  stir, 
called  the  party  of  war-enthusiasts 'Jingoes.'  The  name  was 
caught  up  at  once.  The  famous  ejaculation  of  Miss  Carolinia 
Wilhelmina  Amelia  Skeggs  in  'The  Vicar  of  Wakefield,'  had 
proved  prophetical.  She  swore  '  By  the  living  Jingo  ! '  and 
now,  indeed,  the  Jingo  was  alive !  " 

But  before  anything  very  decided  was  done  in  England 
(for  the  members  of  Lord  Beaconsfield's  cabinet  were  not 
all  Jingoes),  news  came  that  General  Skobeleff  was  within 
half  a  day's  march  of  Constantinople.  Russia  forced 
Turkey  to  sign  an  armistice ;  and  then  the  Treaty  of  San 
Stefano,  which  stipulated  for  almost  complete  independence 
for  the  Christian  provinces  of  Turkey,  and  made  Bulgaria, 
north  and  south  of  the  Balkans,  a  great  new  state,  with  a 
port  on  the  ^gean  Sea,  was  signed  by  the  Sultan  and  the 
Emperor. 

England  would  not  consent  to  this  treaty.  She  said  that 
by  the  Treaty  of  Paris  the  affairs  of  Turkey  and  Turkish 
dependencies  were  to  be  interfered  with  by  no  one  Power, 
that  if  any  changes  must  be  made,  all  the  Five  Great 
Powers  must  agree.  After  much  diplomatic  discussion,  and 
great  disappointment  on  the  part  of  the  victorious  Russian 
troops,  it  was  resolved  to  submit  the  Treaty  of  San  Stefano 
to  a  Congress  to  be  held  at  Berlin.  To  the  amazement 
of  everybody,  Lord  Beaconsfield,  though  Prime  Minister  of 
England,  decided  to  go  himself  as  the  English  representa- 
tive. He  and  Lord  Salisbury  went  together. 

Prince  Bismarck,  in  whose  place  the  Congress  was  held, 
received  the  English  Prime  Minister  most  cordially.  His 
journey  to  Berlin  was  almost  a  triumphal  progress. 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  365 

"  The  part  Lord  Beaconsfield  had  undertaken  to  play  suited 
his  love  for  the  picturesque  and  the  theatrical.  The  temptation 
was  irresistible  to  a  nature  so  fond  of  show  and  state  and 
pomp.  It  seemed  a  proper  culmination  of  his  career  that  he 
should  take  his  seat  in  a  great  European  council  chamber, 
and  there  help  to  dictate  terms  of  peace  to  Europe  and  its 
kings." 

Strange  to  say,  however,  the  Congress  of  Berlin  was 
hardly  a  council.  Its  proceedings  had  been  cut  and  dried 
beforehand.  Lord  Beaconsfield  had  entered  into  two  secret 
agreements,  —  one  with  Turkey,  one  with  Russia.  By  that 
between  England  and  Turkey,  the  English  Government 
undertook  to  guarantee  to  Turkey  all  her  Asiatic  posses- 
sions ;  and  Turkey  was  to  make  Cyprus  a  present  to  Eng- 
land. The  secret  arrangement  with  Russia  bound  England 
to  consent  to  giving  back  Bessarabia  to  Russia,  —  a  province 
which  had  been  rent  from  her  after  the  Crimean  war,  — 
and  the  important  port  of  Batoum,  on  the  Black  Sea.  This 
agreement  had  conceded  everything  in  advance  which  the 
people  of  England  believed  their  representatives  were 
struggling  for  in  the  Congress.  Russia  only  submitted  the 
Treaty  of  San  Stefano  to  the  Congress  because  England 
guaranteed  her  beforehand  the  things  she  most  desired. 
Those  who  were  most  wronged  and  disappointed  were  the 
Christians  of  Roumelia,  who  had  hoped  to  be  joined  to 
Bulgaria ;  Roumania,  which  had  to  give  back  Bessarabia  to 
Russia ;  and  the  Greeks,  who  had  counted  on  obtaining  a 
better  frontier  out  of  Turkish  spoils. 

By  these  pre-arrangements  the  Congress  of  Berlin  deter- 
mined five  points,  without  much  discussion.  Russia  got 
Batoum  and  Bessarabia,  while  Roumania,  greatly  outraged  by 
the  loss  of  her  province,  was  forced  to  content  herself  with 
a  marshy  tract  at  the  mouth  of  the  Danube  as  compensa- 
tion for  that  sacrifice  and  for  the  blood  and  money  she  had 
expended  in  the  war.  Roumania,  Servia,  and  Montenegro 
were  relieved  from  all  tribute  to  the  Sultan ;  Montenegro 
got  her  coveted  port  of  Cattaro,  on  the  Adriatic ;  Bulgaria 
was  only  Bulgaria  north  of  the  Balkans ;  but  Roumelia  was 


366  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

to  have  a  Christian  governor.  The  Prince  of  Bulgaria  was 
to  be  elected  by  the  people,  with  the  approval  of  the  Sultan 
and  all  five  of  the  Great  Powers.  Moreover,  the  Bulgarian 
Prince  was  not  to  be  a  member  of  any  reigning  royal  family. 
The  Sultan  promised  civil  rights  to  all  his  Christian  subjects, 
and  to  be  a  better  ruler  in  Crete.  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina 
were  placed  under  the  protectorate  of  Austria. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  by  the  substitution  of  this  treaty 
for  the  Treaty  of  San  Stefano,  Russia  lost  much  that  she  had 
fought  for,  and  England  gained  much  for  which  she  had 
paid  no  price  ;  the  Christian  populations  in  Turkey,  too,  for 
whom  Russia  undertook  the  war,  lost  much  by  the  exchange. 

In  glory  and  triumph  Lord  Beaconsfield  returned  to 
England.  He  was  now  an  old  man,  but  full  of  vigor. 

"  He  had  passed  through  years  of  struggle  with  almost  insur- 
mountable difficulties;  years  of  steady  faith  in  himself,  undis- 
turbed by  almost  universal  ridicule;  years  of  rise  and  fall,  of 
action  and  inaction,  success  and  disaster,  which  brought  him  to 
the  climax  of  his  greatness.  He  and  Bismarck  were  the  two 
greatest  men  in  all  the  world.  He  had  attained  a  position  of 
popularity  which  Lord  Palmerston  had  never  attained.  He  was 
the  demi-god  of  the  populace.  The  proudest  moment  of  his 
life  was  probably  when,  after  a  semi-theatrical  entry  into  Lon- 
don, he  stood  in  a  window  of  the  Foreign  Office,  addressing  the 
crowd  that  cheered  him  rapturously,  telling  them  that  he  had 
brought  back  Peace  with  Honor."  1 

And  he  did  bring  back  peace.  The  war  feeling  was 
soothed,  for  England  had  triumphed.  But  after  that  time 
came  a  reaction,  and  his  popularity  waned.  In  the  moment 
of  his  triumph  his  rival,  Mr.  Gladstone,  had  "  been  nowhere." 
He  and  his  wife  had  even  been  hustled  by  a  mob  of  Lon- 
don roughs  boisterously  returning  from  a  Jingo  carnival. 

But  the  "  little  wars  "  that  the  Beaconsfield  administra- 
tion next  engaged  in  were  not  popular  in  England.  The 
winter  of  1878-79  was  a  hard  one  for  the  poor.  Trade 
was  dull,  the  weather  cold,  and  there  was  great  distress  in 
England.  The  House  of  Commons  missed  its  great  leader, 

1  History  of  our  Own  Times  (Justin  McCarthy). 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  367 

and  the  odious  policy  of  obstructiveness  adopted  by  the 
Irish  party  wearied  the  patience  of  the  House.  All  these 
things  broke  up  Lord  Beaconsfield's  popularity,  never  so 
great  in  the  provinces  as  it  was  in  London.  Parliament  was 
dissolved  in  the  spring  of  1880,  and  the  new  Parliament 
chosen  gave  a  majority  of  one  hundred  and  twenty  votes  for 
the  Liberals  and  against  Lord  Beaconsfield's  Government. 
Lord  Beaccnsfield  of  course  had  to  resign,  and  Mr.  Glad- 
stone came  into  power. 

The  opinion  of  many  intelligent  foreigners  concerning 
Lord  Beaconsfield  was  thus  uttered  by  a  German  Liberal 
to  a  travelling  Englishman  :  — 

"  The  sinister  forces  with  which  he  had  to  contend  may  have 
proved  too  strong  for  him  ;  foreign  foes  and  domestic  faction 
may  have  prevented  him  from  doing  all  he  designed :  but  in  a 
great  world  crisis  he  bore  himself  steadfastly,  patiently,  strenu- 
ously, heroically  ;  and  he  imparted  his  own  spirit  to  England. 
And  more  than  that,  mein  Herr,  —  much  more,  if  your  people 
had  but  known  it,  —  your  patriot  minister  in  his  struggle  with 
the  barbarian  had  all  free  Europe  at  his  back." 

In  writing  this  chapter,  I  have  had  before  me  two  sets  of 
sketches  of  Lord  Beaconsfield  and  his  career.  The  writers 
on  one  side  cannot  find  words  bitter  enough  with  which  to 
mock  him  ;  those  on  the  other  side  praise  him  as  little 
lower  than  a  king  of  men.  He  went  into  retirement  at  his 
country  seat  at  Hughenden ;  but  it  was  not  for  long.  In 
less  than  two  years  after  he  quitted  public  life  he  died, 
April  19,  1 88 1. 

On  the  night  of  his  death  it  was  said  that  after  a  violent 
spasm  and  breathlessness,  he  lay  back,  murmuring  in  a  low 
voice,  "  I  am  overwhelmed."  Yet  a  little  later  he  raised 
himself  from  his  pillows,  threw  back  his  arms,  expanded  his 
chest,  as  he  was  wont  to  do  when  making  a  speech,  and  his 
lips  were  seen  to  move.  The  action  was  characteristic. 
Even  by  Death  he  would  not  acknowledge  himself  van- 
quished, without  reply.  His  last  words  were  :  "  Is  there 
any  bad  news?" 


368   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Not  long  after  success  began  to  attend  him  some  words 
from  "  In  Memoriam  "  were  applied  to  him.  The  last  lines 
of  the  quotation  were  laughed  at  as  grandiloquently  inap- 
propriate. Before  he  died,  they  came  true. 

"  Who  breaks  his  birth's  invidious  bar, 

And  grasps  the  skirts  of  happy  chance, 
And  breasts  the  blows  of  circumstance, 
And  grapples  with  his  evil  star; 

"  Who  makes  by  force  his  merit  known, 
And  lives  to  clutch  the  golden  keys, 
To  mould  a  mighty  state's  decrees, 
And  shape  the  whisper  of  the  throne  ; 

"  And  moving  up  from  high  to  higher, 

Becomes,  on  Fortune's  crowning  slope, 
The  pillar  of  a  people's  hope, 
The  centre  of  a  world's  desire." 


Lord  Beaconsfield  was  buried  in  his  parish  church  at 
Hughenden.  He  assuredly  had  a  claim  to  be  interred  in 
Westminster  Abbey;  but  a  grave  there  was  refused  him, 
probably  in  view  of  his  uncertain  Christianity. 

His  residence  was  Hughenden  Manor,  a  fine  old  place  in 
Buckinghamshire,  which  had  once  belonged  to  Burke,  and 
was  purchased  by  Lady  Beaconsfield.  The  Prince  of  Wales, 
the  Duke  of  Connaught,  and  Prince  Leopold  attended  his 
funeral,  and  many  working-men  and  all  the  neighboring 
poor.  Two  days  later  the  Queen  and  Princess  Beatrice 
visited  his  grave,  and  laid  on  it  a  wreath  of  white  camelias. 

As  soon  as  he  was  dead  the  Press  and  Parliament  rang 
with  his  praises.  They  spoke  of  him  as  a  man  who,  if  he 
had  faults,  was  always  a  conservator  of  England's  greatness. 
A  statue  of  him  in  his  robes  as  an  earl  has  been  erected 
opposite  to  Westminster  Abbey. 

His  title  died  with  him;  but  the  heir  to  his  estates 
was  his  brother,  Ralph  Disraeli,  to  whose  son,  Coningsby 
Disraeli,  they  were  destined  to  descend. 

Within  a  year  of  his  death  Lord  Beaconsfield  wrote  and 
published  "  Endymion."  This  novel  had  a  great  success. 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  369 

It  is  filled  with  portraits,  under  feigned  names,  of  the  states- 
men and  authors  with  whom  the  writer  had  been  associated, 
and  may  be  read  as  a  brilliant  sketch  of  the  political  his- 
tory of  England  for  forty  years. 

Of  late  years  a  very  interesting  correspondence  between 
Lord  Beaconsfield  and  his  sister  has  been  published.  In  it 
the  world  may  see  more  closely  than  it  could  see  in  his  life 
the  mind  and  heart  of  a  man  who,  though  his  writings  were 
all  more  or  less  autobiographical,  was,  as  to  his  private  life, 
very  reserved. 

"  A  French  academician,  "  says  Lord  Houghton,  "  re- 
marked when  Lord  Beaconsfield's  administration  failed, 
and  Mr.  Gladstone  came  into  power,  that  England  had 
exchanged  one  artist  for  another." 

Among  the  numerous  sketches  in  "  Endymion  "  is  one 
of  poor  Hudson,  the  Railway  King,  who,  when  his  ruin 
came,  said  of  the  men  he  had  enriched  by  opening  up  the 
country  by  roads  which  failed  to  pay  at  first,  who  drove 
him  into  bankruptcy,  "  They  took  me  from  behind  the 
counter  and  gave  me  to  administer  greater  affairs  under 
greater  difficulties  than  even  Mr.  Pitt  undertook  in  the 
great  war.  I  had  some  ^70,000,000  to  manage,  and 
I  may  have  made  some  mistakes  in  doing  it.  Those 
men  who  have  lost  pounds  by  me  are  hounding  me  to 
death ;  but  where  are  those  who  have  made  thousands 
by  me?" 

"  Endymion "  is  the  novel  of  pecuniary  good  fortune. 
It  cheers  those  weary  of  the  strain  of  poverty  to  see  its 
success  and,  in  imagination,  share  in  its  profusion.  "  It 
has  been  pleasantly  said,"  remarks  Lord  Houghton,  "  that 
the  English  aristocracy  might  have  gone  the  way  of  their 
order  all  over  Europe,  but  for  the  two  M's,  —  minerals  and 
marriage.  There  never  was  a  novel  with  so  little  love  in 
it  as  '  Endymion,'  so  many  proposals  of  marriage,  such 
unexpected  and  unearned  accessions  of  wealth." 

Before  closing  this  chapter,  let  me  add  a  few  words  upon 
a  subject  that  influenced  all  Lord  Beaconsfield's  writings, 
his  personal  characteristics,  and,  in  part,  his  policy. 

24 


37O    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  It  is  barely  fifty  years,"  said  an  English  journalist,  writing 
not  long  after  Lord  Beaconsfield's  death,  "  since  the  Jews  in 
England  were  considered  outcasts;  since  they  were  throughout 
Europe  legally  disqualified  for  the  offices  which,  indeed,  a  uni- 
versal prejudice  would  have  rendered  it  impossible  for  them  to 
hold  ;  and  now  there  is  scarcely  a  State,  except  Russia,  in  which 
they  are  not,  or  have  not  been,  ministers.  Especially  on  the 
Continent  do  the  Jews  conduct  journalism.  In  England  at  the 
time  when  eight  hundred  thousand  English  Roman  Catholics 
had  not  a  single  English  Roman  Catholic  in  the  House  of  Com- 
mons, eighty  thousand  English  Jews  had  eight  representives. 
The  circumstances  which  for  ages  made  the  Jews  dwellers  in 
cities,  and  the  oppressions  which  made  wealth  their  only  protec- 
tion, have  combined  to  make  them  admirable  men  of  business. 
They  bring  especial  brains  to  the  work,  and  especial  habits  of 
combination." 

A  sort  of  great  network  of  family  interest  enables  the 
Jews  to  exercise  control  over  the  money  markets  and  the 
jewel  markets  of  the  world. 

In  politics  they  are  mostly  opportunists,  willing  to  accept 
any  form  of  government  which  admits  of  free  careers ;  and 
while  anxious  to  obtain  the  largest  attainable  measure  of 
material  comfort,  they  aim  to  secure  freedom,  support,  and 
education  for  the  people. 

With  Prince  Bismarck's  intense  hatred  of  the  Jews,  it  is 
a  little  amusing  to  think  of  the  high  consideration  he  showed 
Lord  Beaconsfield  at  the  Berlin  Congress  ;  but  his  bitterness 
against  the  race  has  increased  with  his  advancing  years, 
backed  by  popular  feeling  in  Germany  and  an  opinion  that 
prevails  there  that  the  Jews  are  in  sympathy  with  the  French, 
whom  they  helped  to  pay  their  war  debt  in  1872. 

In  1884,  an  institution  was  set  on  foot  in  England  in 
memory  of  Lord  Beaconsfield,  with  the  title  of  "  The  Prim- 
rose League."  The  great  day  of  the  year  for  the  demon- 
strations of  this  society  is  April  19,  —  the  day  of  Lord 
Beaconsfield's  death,  and  also  his  birthday.  On  this  day 
his  grave  at  Beaconsfield  is  heaped  with  primroses,  and  his 
followers  all  wear  them  as  a  tribute  to  his  memory. 

A  few  years  ago  the  league  Avas  said  to  number  seven 


LORD  BEACONSFIELD.  371 

hundred  thousand  men,  women,  and  children.  The  idea 
originated  with  Sir  Henry  Drummond  Wolff  (son  of"  the 
great  Jewish-Christian  missionary)  and  Lord  Randolph 
Churchill. 

"  The  Primrose  League  was  founded,"  says  a  writer  in 
one  of  the  London  journals,  "  under  the  idea  that  what  had 
been  done  by  fits  and  starts  whenever  an  election  came 
round  should  be  carried  through  with  continuous  energy 
in  the  intervals,"  —  that  is  to  say,  in  plain  English,  that 
social  influence,  very  potent  in  English  elections,  should 
be  carried  on  continuously  for  election  purposes. 

"The  friends  of  the  candidates,"  continues  the  journalist, 
"  both  men  and  women,  are  to  be  all  things  to  all  men  and  their 
wives.  Gentlemen  and  ladies  of  social  position  visit  shop- 
keepers, artisans,  farmers,  laborers,  and  their  wives  ;  talk  with 
them  freely  and  pleasantly,  show  interest  in  their  concerns,  and 
end  by  asking  them  for  votes. 

"  The  League  proposes  to  make  this  work,  done  so  often  in 
elections,  a  perpetuity.  That  duchesses  and  washerwomen,  the 
squire's  lady  and  the  blacksmith's  wife,  should  be  linked  together 
in  clubs,  excursions,  and  picnics  in  semi-social,  semi-political 
gatherings,  not  only  at  election  time,  but  all  the  year  round ; 
that  they  should  belong  to  the  same  league,  wear  the  same 
badge,  sing  or  listen  to  the  same  songs,  and  glow  with  fervor  in 
the  same  cause." 

This  view  of  the  League  is  not  exactly  a  friendly  one  ; 
but  here  is  an  account  of  a  Primrose  League  celebration 
in  Warwickshire,  on  the  igth  of  April,  1888,  looked  on 
with  more  kindly  eyes  :  a  — 

"  Nothing  in  the  whole  kingdom  of  flowers  is  lovelier  than  the 
yellow  primrose  of  Warwickshire,  —  the  'pale  primrose'  of 
Shakespear.  Its  size,  its  delicate  color,  accentuated  by  deeper 
color  in  its  midst,  its  pronounced  and  elegant  outline,  render  it 
very  effective  for  decorative  purposes.  And  what  was  Beacons- 
field,  if  not  decorative  ? 

"  At  Leamington,  which  is  almost  the  central  spot  of  Eng- 
land, primroses  seemed  universal.  The  local  branch  of  the 

1  The  Outlook  (Christian  Union). 


372    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Primrose  League  kept  open  house  that  day  at  the  Town  Hall. 
Primroses  bloomed  in  the  windows  among  the  cauliflowers  and 
potatoes  of  the  greengrocers,  in  the  windows  of  the  draper,  and 
among  the  sirloins  and  legs  of  mutton  on  the  butchers'  stalls. 
The  jewellers  displayed  primrose  jewelry  of  every  description,  — 
a  single  primrose,  a  cluster  of  primroses,  a  primrose  with  the 
motto,  '  Peace  with  Honor.'  Many  of  the  beautiful  carriage- 
horses  were  decorated  with  primroses,  while  their  drivers  wore 
bouquets  of  them  in  their  button-holes.  The  children,  too,  caught 
the  infection  ;  for  the  girls  and  boys  in  England  assume  their 
childish  part  in  politics. 

"  I  saw  a  jolly  little  pair  standing  at  a  street-corner.  They 
looked  about  ten  years  old.  The  boy  had  his  small  bouquet  of 
primroses  pinned  firmly  on  his  breast,  and  was  fastening  that  of 
the  little  girl  to  the  shoulder  of  her  coat.  I  thought,  Where 
will  the  Primrose  League  be  when  the  boy  is  old  enough  to  be  a 
voter  ? 

"  The  staircase  and  lobby  of  the  Town  Hall  were  covered  with 
primroses.  In  the  hall  hung  a  dreadful  portrait  of  Queen  Vic- 
toria, draped  with  primrose  silk.  Intermingled  with  the  prim- 
roses and  banners  on  the  walls  were  the  crown,  the  Prince  of 
Wales'  feathers,  and  the  earl's  coronet  of  Beaconsfield.  A 
portrait  and  a  bust  of  the  late  Earl  were  also  there,  honored  with 
flags  and  flowers. 

"  The  orator  of  the  day  told  us  that  the  especial  glory  of  the 
Primrose  League  was  that  it  included  every  class  in  the  land, 
from  the  highest  to  the  laborer.  He  called  upon  the  laborer 
and  the  laborer's  wife  to  work  for  its  extension.  He  said  that 
already  it  numbered  many  laborers  among  its  members. 

"  Feeling  a  little  doubtful  about  this,  I  asked  an  intelligent 
laborer's  wife,  living  in  a  hamlet  made  up  of  laborer's  cottages, 
how  many  of  them  belonged  to  the  Primrose  League.  '  None,' 
was  the  reply.  I  then  repeated  the  statement  of  the  M.  P. 
'  If  there  are  any  laborers  in  the  Primrose  League,'  she  said, 
'  they  joined  it  just  because  they  were  expected  to.'  " 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

THE    SECOND    CABUL    MASSACRE. 

TN  the  autumn  of  1842,  Lord  Ellenborough,  under  instruc- 
•*-  tions  from  the  ministry  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington  and 
Sir  Robert  Peel,  proclaimed  that,  rinding  Shah  Soojah  and 
his  family  were  not  the  choice  of  the  Afghan  people,  the 
English  armies,  after  punishing  the  massacres  of  their  Resi- 
dent and  their  people,  would  withdraw  from  Cabul,  set  Dost 
Mohammed  at  liberty,  and  leave  the  Afghans  to  choose 
what  ruler  they  would.  Their  choice  fell  at  once  on  Dost 
Mohammed,  and  he  accordingly  remounted  his  throne. 
He  made  a  treaty  of  peace  and  alliance  with  the  English, 
and  continued  true  to  them  as  long  as  he  lived.  Shere  Ali, 
one  of  his  sons,  succeeded  him.  With  great  prudence,  he 
resolved  to  exclude  foreigners,  both  English  and  Russian, 
as  much  as  possible  from  his  dominions.  But  under  the 
circumstances  in  which  he  was  placed,  this  was  attempting 
the  impossible. 

No  sooner  was  the  Turkish  war  of  1877-78  ended,  and 
Russia  checkmated,  after  her  large  expenditure  of  money 
and  blood,  by  Beaconsfield  and  Bismarck  in  the  Congress  of 
Berlin,  than  her  rulers  set  themselves  more  perseveringly 
and  patiently  than  ever  to  push  her  power  towards  the  East, 
and  gain  communication  with  the  Pacific  Ocean  and  the 
Indian  seas.  Between  Persia  and  British  India  lies  Afghan- 
istan,—  a  "  land  of  the  mountain  and  the  flood,"  the  Switzer- 
land of  Asia.  Herat,  one  of  its  three  chief  cities,  is  on  the 
direct  road  to  Bushire,  the  chief  port  on  the  Persian  Gulf. 

Turkestan,  or,  as  it  was  called  in  my  young  days,  Inde- 
pendent Tartary,  has  been  the  scene  of  Russian  military 
operations  for  the  last  half  century.  By  1865  Russia  had 
acquired  the  northern  part  of  this  Independent  Tartary,  and 


374    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

then  she  took  Tashkent  and  Khokan,  which  brought  her 
possessions  near  the  Khanate  of  Bokhara,  while  over  the 
mountains  lay  Kashgar  and  Yarkand.  In  1868,  Samarcand 
and  Bokhara  were  taken.  Khiva  alone  of  the  Khanates 
remained  independent ;  but  in  1873  three  Russian  columns 
were  marched  against  it.  One  perished  of  heat  and  thirst ; 
one  came  near  doing  so ;  the  third  succeeded. 

General  Skobeleff,  while  employed  in  these  wars,  early 
conceived  the  idea  that  if  Russia  could  obtain  paramount 
influence  in  Afghanistan,  she  might,  in  the  event  of  a  war 
with  England,  march  armies  into  British  India  through  that 
country,  as  Napoleon  had  once  proposed  to  Alexander  I., 
or  she  might  barter  her  influence  in  Afghanistan  with  Eng- 
land for  the  consent  of  the  English  to  her  acquisition  of 
Constantinople. 

During  the  year  1877,  when  Russia  was  occupied  with 
the  Turkish  war,  the  English  Government,  having  ventured 
on  some  remonstrances  concerning  Russia's  advances  in  the 
East,  was  answered  roughly  by  Prince  Gortschakoff,  that 
"  while  he  had  a  whale  to  look  after,  he  could  not  trouble 
himself  about  the  little  fishes."  But  he  very  seriously  con- 
cerned himself  about  the  little  fishes,  notwithstanding.  A 
Russian  embassy  was  being  fitted  out  to  conciliate  Shere 
Ali ;  and  if  the  Treaty  of  Berlin  had  been  wholly  unsatisfac- 
tory to  Russia,  all  her  plans  were  made  for  an  advance  on 
India,  for  stirring  up  its  Native  populations  against  the 
British,  and  assuming  a  strong  influence,  if  not  authority,  in 
Afghanistan. 

But  to  return  to  the  internal  affairs  of  Afghanistan,  which, 
up  to  1866,  had  remained  in  a  comparatively  peaceful  state 
for  twelve  years.  Dost  Mohammed,  who,  after  his  return 
to  his  throne  in  1842,  had  remained  faithful  to  his  alliance 
with  the  English,  died  in  1863.  He  had  named  his  son 
Shere  Ali  as  his  successor.  Even  at  that  time  Shere  Ali 
was  considered  the  one  of  his  sons  who  was  least  friendly 
to  the  English ;  but  his  brother  Azim  had  been  always  in 
their  favor,  and  was  the  only  one  of  the  Afghan  chiefs  who 
had  endeavored  to  prevent  the  murder  of  Sir  William 


THE  SECOND   CABUL   MASSACRE.  375 

Macnaughten.  He  was  living  in  British  India  at  the 
time  of  his  father's  death,  and  was  confident  that  the 
English  would  support  his  claim  to  the  succession.  But 
the  English  had  had  enough  of  interfering  with  the  suc- 
cession to  the  throne  of  Afghanistan,  and  the  Viceroy  of 
India  declared  in  substance  that  the  Afghans  must  settle 
their  affairs  their  own  way,  and  that  England  would  sup- 
port whichever  ruler  could  obtain  and  keep  the  throne. 
This  obliviousness  of  Azim  Khan's  past  services  probably 
first  impressed  the  Afghans  with  the  idea  that  England 
was  a  thankless  power. 

In  1864,  Shere  Ali  was  chief  Ameer,  and  the  other  sons 
of  Dost  Mohammed  had  all  withdrawn  from  court  and 
shut  themselves  up  in  strongholds  in  the  hills.  The  two 
most  formidable  were  Azful  Khan  and  Azim,  the  latter  of 
whom  had  inherited  the  talent  of  his  father.  As  soon  as 
spring  opened,  Shere  Ali  sent  expeditions  against  both 
these  princes.  Azim  was  defeated,  and  took  refuge  in 
British  India.  Azful's  stronghold  was  in  Northern  Afghan- 
istan, beyond  the  hills.  After  some  fighting,  an  agree- 
ment was  reached  by  the  brothers,  by  which  Azful  was 
to  be  allowed  to  retain  the  government  of  that  part  of 
Northern  Afghanistan  called  Balkh. 

Azful  had  a  son,  Abderrahman  Khan,  a  young  chief  of 
great  promise  and  spirit  (the  present  ruler  of  Cabul). 
Abderrahman  Khan  would  not  yield  to  his  uncle,  like  his 
father,  but  fled  to  the  Russians  on  the  Oxus,  which  so 
enraged  Shere  Ali  that  he  seized  on  the  unfortunate  Azful 
and  put  him  in  prison. 

All  1864  and  1865  Shere  Ali  was  beset  by  enemies,  and 
lived  in  a  weltering  chaos  of  insurrection.  In  the  summer 
of  1865  he  fought  a  great  battle  and  defeated  two  of 
his  brothers  and  a  nephew;  but  the  victory  was  dearly 
purchased,  for  in  the  me!6e  his  favorite  son  and  des- 
tined heir,  Fyz  Mohammed,  was  pistolled  by  one  of  his 
own  uncles. 

This  event  produced  such  a  shock  upon  the  mind  of 
Shere  Ali  that  his  spirit  was  completely  broken.  During 


376   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

the  rest  of  the  war  he  took  no  interest  in  the  opera- 
tions of  his  enemies,  or  in  the  counter-operations  of  his 
friends. 


"  Buried  in  the  seclusion  of  inner  chambers,  he  admitted  none 
but  a  few  personal  attendants  within  his  sight ;  and  if  at  inter- 
vals he  broke  silence,  it  was  only  to  wish,  with  a  burst  of  Nero- 
like  ferocity,  that  he  could  cut  the  throat  of  every  man  in  Cabul 
and  Candahar;  or  to  declare,  with  utter  despondency,  that  he 
would  depart  out  of  Afghanistan,  and  learn  to  forget  his  home 
and  people  in  England,  Russia,  or  in  the  Holy  Land  of  Arabia. 
One  night  he  jumped  into  a  tank,  and  began  groping  under 
water  in  search  of  his  dead  son.  His  guards  rescued  him,  but 
he  remained  insensible  for  some  time  afterwards." 

Meantime,  Prince  Abderrahman  was  not  unlike  the 
Young  Chevalier.  He  raised  an  army  in  Bokhara,  and 
invaded  Afghanistan  to  set  his  father  free.  He  released 
him,  indeed ;  but  Azful  Khan's  mind  and  strength  had 
given  way  in  his  captivity.  During  this  time  the  English 
had  carefully  abstained  from  any  interference  for  or  against 
either  party,  —  a  policy  which  Shere  Ali  resented,  because, 
had  he  even  had  the  annual  pension  of  ^60,000  accorded 
to  his  father  by  the  English  Government,  it  would  have 
gone  far  in  assisting  him  to  keep  himself  on  the  throne. 

Azim  Khan  in  his  turn  endeavored  to  gain  the  support  of 
the  English  by  pointing  out  to  them  their  danger  from  the 
Russian  advance,  and  promising,  if  he  were  the  Ameer  of 
Afghanistan,  that  he  would  do  all  in  his  power  to  oppose 
the  Russians.  But  the  English  Government  was  not  to  be 
drawn  into  Afghan  politics.  Azim  got  the  better  of  his 
brother  for  a  brief  period,  and  sat  on  the  throne  of  Cabul ; 
then  the  tide  turned  again  in  Shere  Ali's  favor,  chiefly 
owing  to  the  energy  and  superior  talents  of  his  son,  Yakoob 
Khan.  The  rebellious  princes,  however,  still  held  Afghan- 
istan beyond  the  mountains;  but  by  1868  the  English 
Government  was  alarmed  by  the  advancing  power  of  the 
Russians.  Lord  Mayo,  being  appointed  Viceroy  of  India, 
established  a  fast  friendship  with  Shere  Ali,  which  was, 


THE  SECOND   CABUL   MASSACRE.  377 

however,  only  to  last  until  the  death  of  poor  Lord  Mayo, 
who  was  stabbed  by  a  convict  while  inspecting  a  penal 
settlement  in  the  Andaman  Isles.  Shere  Ali  had  said 
during  his  brief  exile  :  — 

"  The  English  seek  only  their  own  interests.  They  keep 
their  friendship  for  the  strongest,  and  they  change  with  the 
changes  of  fortune.  I  will  not  waste  precious  life  in  enter- 
taining false  hopes  of  assistance  from  the  English,  and  will 
seek  alliances  with  other  Powers." 

This  state  of  mind  had  been  cultivated  in  him  by  Russian 
agents,  by  embassies,  by  flatteries,  by  letters  of  congratu- 
lation. But  as  long  as  Lord  Mayo  lived,  who,  with  all  his 
natural  heartiness  and  energy,  had  thrown  himself  into  a 
personal  friendship  with  Shere  Ali,  any  breach  in  the  rela- 
tions of  England  with  Afghanistan  was  postponed. 

All  seemed  prosperous  with  Shere  Ali ;  all  seemed  to 
favor  the  leading  idea  of  England's  northern  Indian  policy, 
which  is  that  as  Switzerland  is  a  neutral  country,  a  barrier 
between  jealous  and  contending  nations,  so  Afghanistan, 
the  Switzerland  of  the  East,  should  become  a  barrier  be- 
tween Russia  in  Central  Asia  and  British  India. 

Lord  Mayo,  one  of  whose  last  acts  was  to  hold  a  durbar 
at  Umballa  and  make  a  firm  alliance  with  Shere  Ali,  was 
succeeded  by  Lord  Northbrook,  in  whom  Shere  Ali  no 
longer  found  a  personal  friend.  It  is  needless  to  enter  into 
all  the  causes  of  dispute  between  the  Ameer  and  the  new 
Viceroy.  The  latter  persisted  in  declaring  that  there  was 
no  danger  to  British  India  from  Russia,  in  refusing  the 
Ameer's  demands  for  men  and  money,  and  treating  very 
coldly  his  plan  for  setting  aside  his  eldest  son,  Yakoob  Khan, 
as  his  successor,  in  favor  of  a  very  young  son  whom  he 
dearly  loved,  Abdullah  Jan.  The  correspondence  between 
the  Ameer  and  the  Viceroy  was  sometimes  almost  insolent 
upon  Shere  Ali's  part ;  always  cold  and  stately  on  the  part 
of  the  Viceroy.  It  is  manifest  that  the  parties  cordially 
disliked  and  distrusted  each  other.  The  Russians  mean- 
time turned  all  this  to  their  advantage.  As  the  English 


3/8    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

seemed  disposed  to  favor  Yakoob  Khan's  claim  to  the  suc- 
cession, the  Russians,  to  conciliate  Shere  Ali,  favored  Ab- 
dullah Jan.  The  latter  was  proclaimed  heir-apparent  in 
1873,  and  soon  after  Yakoob  broke  into  rebellion.  This 
was  put  down,  and  Yakoob  was  imprisoned  four  years  by 
his  father,  after  which  he  escaped,  and  fled  into  Russian 
territory. 

It  had  been  a  great  object  with  the  English  to  put  resi- 
dent agents  into  Herat,  Cabul,  and  Candahar.  Shere  Ali 
was  equally  resolved  they  should  do  nothing  of  the  sort. 
In  the  year  1878  he  believed  in  a  coming  war  between 
England  and  Russia,  and  carefully  sat  on  the  fence,  ready 
to  drop  down  on  the  winning  side.  But  Jingoism  satisfied 
itself  with  peace  with  honor. 

Meantime  Skobeleff  was  again  in  Turkestan,  laying  siege 
to  the  vast  stronghold  of  Goek  Topi ;  he  had  not  forgot- 
ten his  views  of  the  importance  to  his  country  of  strongly 
cementing  a  friendship  with  the  ruler  of  Afghanistan,  who- 
ever he  might  be ;  and,  to  that  end,  he  sent  to  the  court 
at  Cabul  the  young  Ali  Khan,  or  Alikanoff,  a  Russian 
officer  who  had  greatly  distinguished  himself. 

How  far  Alikanoff  induced  Shere  Ali  to  compromise 
himself  by  promises  of  alliance  with  the  Russians  is  un- 
known ;  but  undoubtedly  in  his  heart  he  preferred  the 
Russian  alliance  to  the  English. 

Meantime  Lord  Beaconsfield,  in  pursuance  of  his  Indian 
policy,  was  determined  to  secure  for  British  India  what  is 
known  as  "  the  scientific  frontier ;  "  that  is,  a  northern 
and  northwestern  boundary  defended  by  mountains,  the 
passes  through  which  the  British  should  hold. 

The  English  Viceroy  sent  a  polite  intimation  to  the 
Ameer  that  Queen  Victoria  had  added  Empress  of  India  to 
her  titles ;  but  Shere  Ali,  who  was  again  suffering  domes- 
tic sorrow  (his  boy  Abdullah  Jan  having  died),  returned 
little  or  no  answer.  Then  it  was  determined  to  send  a 
diplomatic  Mission  to  Cabul,  to  insist  on  British  residents 
being  received  at  court  and  at  Herat  and  Candahar. 
This  Mission  was  accompanied  by  a  thousand  soldiers, 


THE  SECOND   CABUL  MASSACRE.  379 

commanded  by  Sir  Neville  Chamberlain.  When,  in  1878, 
it  reached  the  frontier  of  Afghanistan,  the  officials  refused 
to  let  it  pass  without  express  orders  from  Shere  Ali. 
Shere  Ali  delayed  giving  these  orders.  The  English  Home 
Government  was  telegraphed  to  for  instructions.  The 
result  was  that  England  took  the  position  that  her  envoy 
and  his  Mission  had  been  insulted.  Troops  were  marched 
forward  to  join  those  with  the  Mission ;  Jellalabad  and 
some  other  Afghan  posts  at  the  foot  of  the  mountains  on 
the  India  side  were  taken,  and  the  peaceful  Mission  became 
an  invasion.  The  English  occupied  Cabul  and  Candahar 
without  difficulty,  being  very  little  opposed  by  the  Afghans, 
and  Shere  Ali  fled  away  beyond  the  mountains  into  Balkh, 
where  soon  afterwards  he  died,  —  some  said  by  poison ; 
but  it  is  more  likely  that  his  misfortunes,  acting  upon  his 
excitable  temperament,  caused  his  bodily  powers  to  give 
way.  Shere  Ali  was  a  man  of  royal  presence  and  singular 
physiognomy.  His  appearance  and  his  gestures  showed  a 
strange  mixture  of  ferocity  and  kindliness,  gravity  and  gayety. 
His  features  were  handsome  and  even  kingly  ;  his  eyes  keen 
and  black ;  his  beard  soft  and  silky.  He  was  a  man  who 
had  noble  instincts  and  wild  passions.  He  had  no  doubt 
played  fast  and  loose  with  both  the  Russians  and  the  Eng- 
lish ;  but  that  he  would  have  called  statecraft  and  policy. 
Statecraft  is,  however,  a  game  safe  only  for  great  players. 

Yakoob  Khan,  even  before  his  father's  death,  had  pre- 
sented himself  in  the  English  camp  at  Gaudamah,  at  the 
foot  of  the  Afghan  range,  and  signed  a  treaty  of  alliance 
with  the  English,  granting  them  agents  in  Herat,  Cabul, 
and  Candahar,  and  pledging  the  contracting  parties  to 
assist  each  other.  The  moment  the  treaty  was  signed,  the 
new  ruler  of  Afghanistan  departed  for  Cabul,  and  the 
treaty,  placed  in  a  tin  box,  was  strapped  to  the  back  of 
a  messenger,  Mr.  Jenkyns,  a  Scotchman  of  the  Bengal 
Civil  Service,  who  rode  away  with  it  gayly  and  joyfully, 
making  a  hundred  miles  in  thirteen  hours  to  Peshawar, 
whence  it  was  transmitted  to  the  Viceroy,  then  staying  at 
Simla,  the  cool  station  in  the  Hills. 


380  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

We  read  of  men  riding  with  black  care  behind  them; 
poor  Jenkyns  little  thought  that  in  the  tin  box  at  his  back 
he  carried  war,  not  peace,  and  his  own  death-warrant. 

When  Yakoob  Khan  was  firmly  seated  on  his  throne  a 
new  English  Mission  was  sent  to  greet  him.  The  Mission 
entered  Cabul  on  July  24,  1879,  and  was  received  with 
every  demonstration  of  welcome  and  enthusiasm.  Sir 
Louis  Cavagnari  was  at  its  head,  and  Jenkyns  was  his 
secretary.  The  Mission  was  escorted  by  only  twenty-six 
native  troopers,  and  fifty  infantry  of  the  Guides.  There  was 
no  English  force  in  Cabul  (though  British  troops  were  dis- 
persed here  and  there  through  Afghanistan  in  considerable 
numbers),  and  the  escort  had  been  made  purposely  small, 
that  the  Afghans  might  have  no  ground  for  suspecting  that 
the  English  came  as  conquerors,  or  with  any  intention  of 
overawing  their  new  ruler.  The  buildings  intended  for 
the  residence  of  the  envoy  were  not  ready ;  the  Mission 
therefore  was  assigned  quarters  in  buildings  wholly  un- 
adapted  for  defence. 

"By  Yakoob  Khan  and  his  durbar  —  as  a  privy  council  is 
called  in  India  —  the  embassy  was  treated  with  every  mark  of 
consideration.  The  intercourse  between  His  Highness  and  Sir 
Louis  Cavagnari  was  frequent  and  cordial.  No  apprehensions 
whatever  were  entertained  for  their  own  safety  by  members  of 
the  Mission,  who  freely  showed  themselves  in  the  streets  of 
Cabul,  nor  did  they  find  any  grounds  for  believing  that  the  pop- 
ular feeling  was  averse  to  their  presence.  They  knew,  of  course, 
that  there  were  dangerous  classes  in  Cabul,  and  turbulent  ele- 
ments in  Afghanistan;  but  they  believed  the  Ameer's  authority 
would  be  respected  in  his  capital,  and  that  the  country  south 
of  the  Paropamisus  hills  was  safe  from  disturbances." 

But  the  Afghans  are  an  excitable  people.  The  sight  of 
a  mere  street  quarrel  will  work  the  spectators  sometimes 
into  a  frenzy.  On  September  3,  not  six  weeks  after  the 
Mission  had  made  its  entry  into  Cabul,  a  body  of  soldiers 
from  Herat  and  its  neighborhood,  indignant  at  the  non- 
payment of  their  arrears  of  pay,  and  believing  that  the 
Ameer  had  received  funds  from  the  English  Government, 


THE  SECOND   CABUL  MASSACRE.  381 

sought  redress  for  their  grievances.  Receiving  no  atten- 
tion from  the  Ameer,  they  turned  to  the  British  Embassy, 
which  they  presumed  to  be  well  provided  with  the  ne- 
cessary funds.  Whether  they  were  instigated  to  this  by 
cunning  chiefs,  or  whether  it  was  the  mere  soldiers'  instinct 
to  go  straight  in  search  of  the  military  chest,  we  do  not 
know.  It  is  no  uncommon  practice  in  semi-barbarous 
countries  for  soldiers  in  distress  for  their  arrears  of  pay 
to  threaten  their  Government ;  and  the  fact  that  the  soldiers 
assailed  the  Resident,  and  not  the  Ameer,  on  this  occasion, 
proves  that  they  looked  upon  the  British  as  paymasters,  in 
the  altered  condition  of  Afghan  affairs. 

"On  Wednesday,  September  3,  the  mutinous  regiments  sur- 
rounded the  British  Mission  house,  and,  ill  adapted  as  the 
Mission  quarters  were  for  defence,  the  gallant  little  garrison 
held  the  place  against  their  foes  for  a  whole  day,  fighting  des- 
perately, and  killing  more  of  their  assailants  than  they  were 
themselves.  The  whole  city  was  in  wild  confusion.  Yakoob 
Khan  insisted  afterwards  that  he  was  besieged  in  his  house, 
and  unable  to  render  any  assistance  to  the  English  Mission. 
He  sent,  however,  a  General  Daood  Shah  to  endeavor  to  pacify 
the  troops ;  but  he  was  unhorsed  and  nearly  murdered.  Then 
he  sent  the  Governor  of  Cabul,  his  own  father-in-law,  on  the 
same  errand;  but  nothing  effectual  could  be  done.  The  struggle 
was  a  desperate  one,  —  the  British  soldiers  fighting  for  their 
lives.  Sir  Louis  Cavagnari  was  wounded  about  mid-day,  and 
probably  perished  in  the  final  assault,  as  he  lay  disabled  from 
his  wound.  Jenkyns  contrived  to  send  a  letter  to  the  Ameer, 
asking  for  assistance,  and  the  Ameer  returned  the  pious  answer, 
'  If  God  will,  I  am  making  preparations.'  The  assault  and  the 
defence  went  on  all  day  ;  at  night  the  building  was  set  on  fire, 
and  in  the  confusion  the  mutineers  succeeded  in  getting  in 
and  massacring  those  who  survived  of  the  defenders.  A  few 
troopers  only  escaped." 

Whether  Yakoob  Khan  was  at  the  bottom  of  this  mas- 
sacre, or  favored  it,  hoping  it  would  turn  out  to  his  advan- 
tage, is  not  known.  Subsequent  investigations  caused  the 
English  Government  to  depose  him.  He  himself  wrote  to 
the  Viceroy  a  week  after  the  massacre  :  — 


382    ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  I  am  dreadfully  distressed  and  aggrieved  at  recent  events, 
but  there  is  no  fighting  against  God's  will.  Eight  days  I  have 
preserved  self  and  family,  through  the  good  offices  of  those  who 
were  friendly  to  me.  I  hope  to  inflict  such  punishment  on  the 
evil-doers  as  will  be  known  world-wide,  and  prove  my  sincerity. 
Some  of  the  cavalry  I  have  dismissed,  and  night  and  day  am 
considering  how  to  put  matters  straight.  I  trust  to  God  for  an 
opportunity  of  showing  my  sincere  friendship  to  the  British 
Government,  and  securing  my  good  name  before  the  world." 

In  spite  of  these  pious  assurances,  Yakoob  was  very  gen- 
erally believed  to  be  secretly  in  league  with  the  rebels; 
and  the  moment  a  rising  against  the  British  was  on  foot, 
national  fanaticism  joined  heart  and  soul  in  it.  There 
were  fakirs  and  prophets  proclaiming  the  war  a  holy  war 
against  the  infidel.  But  the  tribes  that  had  most  come 
under  English  influence  remained  faithful  to  England. 

Prompt  measures  were  taken  by  the  Government  of 
Lord  Beaconsfield,  such  as  drew  forth  praises  even  from 
French  journals.  "  Greatness  is  expensive,"  said  the 
"  Journal  des  D£bats  ;  "  "  and  England,  being  vulnerable 
at  so  many  places,  must  know  how  to  defend  herself  by 
diplomacy  or  war.  Lord  Beaconsfield  has  tried  to  incul- 
cate this.  He  has  given  England  the  feeling  of  possible 
danger." 

General  Sir  Frederick  Roberts  was  put  in  command  of 
a  large  force,  and  marched  as  soon  as  camels  and  other 
means  of  transport  could  be  obtained.  Cabul  was  soon 
reached  and  taken  possession  of.  It  is  a  city  entirely  sur- 
rounded by  high  mountains,  but  it  lies  at  the  foot  of  the 
small,  steep  conical  hill  on  which  is  built  the  Bala  Hissar. 
Yakoob  was  arrested  and  sent  to  India ;  so  was  Daood 
Shah,  his  attempts  to  stop  the  recent  massacre  being 
considered,  on  investigation,  to  have  been  a  mere  feint. 
He  was  an  old  man  of  good  presence  and  a  pleasant  coun- 
tenance. The  Bala  Hissar  was  occupied  by  ten  thousand 
British  troops,  but  the  larger  part  of  the  army  was  en- 
camped at  Shahpur,  a  sort  of  permanent  intrenched  camp, 
a  mile  and  a  half  outside  the  city.  It  had  been  planned  by 


THE  SECOND   CABUL  MASSACRE.  383 

Shere  AH  to  hold  seventy  thousand  men,  and  its  defences 
were  partially  completed.  The  place  was  surrounded  for 
some  weeks  by  a  large  force  of  Afghans,  who,  finding  they 
could  effect  nothing,  day  by  day  melted  away. 

Things  before  long  seemed  again  going  on  peaceably  in 
Afghanistan.  Chiefs,  seeing  the  success  of  the  British,  sent 
in  their  submission,  or  rather  brought  it  themselves,  into 
camp.  Shops  were  reopened  in  Cabul,  trade  was  busy  in 
the  Bazaar ;  a  large  force  of  tribesmen,  having  turned  their 
swords  and  lances  into  spades  and  picks,  were  at  work 
upon  the  roads ;  the  English  doctors  had  opened  a  hospi- 
tal and  a  dispensary,  where  they  not  only  worked  busily, 
curing  the  wounds  of  friend  and  foe,  but  treating  all  kinds 
of  cases  and  healing  all  manner  of  diseases  and  suffering ; 
a  telegraph  line  also  was  being  set  up  between  Cabul  and 
Peshawar. 

The  attention  of  the  Government  had,  however,  been 
chiefly  fixed  on  the  great  question,  Who  should  be  made 
Ameer  of  Afghanistan? 

I  have  already  told  how  Azful  Khan,  father  of  Abderrah- 
man  Khan,  rebelled  against  Shere  Ali,  his  brother  ;  how,  when 
forced  to  submit,  Abderrahman  refused  to  follow  his  ex- 
ample, and  escaped  into  Russian  territory,  whence,  return- 
ing with  an  army,  he  released  his  father,  Azful,  who,  broken 
in  mind  and  body,  went  into  retirement,  while  for  two  years 
Abderrahman  and  his  uncle  Azim  ruled  jointly  in  Cabul. 
Shere  Ali,  however,  recovered  his  throne,  and  Abderrahman 
went  back  to  the  Russians,  who  received  him  kindly,  gave 
him  a  liberal  pension,  and  extended  to  him  their  protection. 
He  was  the  ablest  prince  of  his  family,  and  on  him  the  Eng- 
lish Government  had  fixed  its  eyes.  To  make  him  Ameer 
seemed  a  somewhat  rash  experiment,  for  he  had  lived  so 
many  years  among  the  Russians  that  he  might  naturally  be 
supposed  to  be  under  their  influence  ;  but  the  choice,  so  far  as 
English  interests  are  concerned,  has  answered  well.  Abder- 
rahman still  reigns.  He  has  made  an  able,  though  a  cruel 
ruler,  and  under  him  Afghanistan  has  given  no  further 
trouble  to  the  Viceroy  of  India  or  the  British  Government. 


384    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

That  Government  in  1880  decided  to  negotiate  with  Abder- 
rahman,  who  had  made  his  escape  from  the  protection  of 
the  Russians,  and,  with  a  small  army  of  exiled  Afghans 
and  his  personal  friends,  was  beyond  the  mountains  in 
Northern  Afghanistan.  Having  been  privately  informed  of 
the  British  intentions  concerning  him,  he  slowly  advanced 
with  his  small  force  towards  Cabul.  His  position  was  a 
difficult  one.  He  was  carrying  on  negotiations  with  the 
English,  and  at  the  same  time  was  aware  that  if  his  alliance 
with  them  were  known,  it  would  cost  him  half  his  fanatical 
followers.  However,  as  he  approached  Cabul  it  was 
thought  best  to  risk  everything  and  to  make  public  the 
English  intention  of  raising  him  to  the  throne.  There  was 
at  that  time  with  Sir  Frederick  Roberts  an  English  gentle- 
man afterwards  knighted  as  Sir  Lepel  Griffin,  who  subse- 
quently wrote  so  foolish  a  book  about  a  journey  he  made 
through  the  United  States  that  did  we  know  nothing  else 
about  him  we  should  hardly  be  disposed  to  trust  his  judg- 
ment or  his  observation.  But  in  India  he  knew  that  of 
which  he  wrote.  He  was  the  political  agent  appointed  by 
the  British  Government  to  announce  publicly  to  Abderrah- 
man  that  their  choice  had  fallen  upon  him  to  succeed  Yakoob 
Khan  on  the  throne  of  Afghanistan.  Mr.  Griffin  was  there- 
fore instructed  to  proclaim  him  Ameer  of  Afghanistan  in 
Cabul,  on  July  22,  1880.  A  few  days  later  was  received 
news  of  the  battle  of  Meiwand,  near  Candahar,  fought  July 
24,  1 880.  Of  one  British  regiment,  the  Sixty-sixth,  the  Berk- 
shire regiment,  as  it  was  called,  275  men  were  killed  out  of 
364  who  went  into  action.  The  fighting  was  desperate  on 
the  part  of  the  English  ;  the  struggle  at  the  last  was  to  save, 
not  their  lives,  but  their  colors.  Of  fourteen  officers  who 
in  turn  carried  them,  eleven  were  killed. 

The  defeat  of  this  gallant  force  did  not,  however,  alter 
the  predetermined  policy  of  Sir  Frederick  Roberts.  He 
marched  his  force  at  Shahpur  to  Candahar,  brought  away 
the  garrison,  including  the  broken  remains  of  the  defeated 
column,  and  then  marched  towards  India,  leaving  orders 
to  Sir  Donald  Stewart  in  the  Bala-Hissar  to  withdraw  his 


THE  SECOND   CABUL  MASSACRE.  385 

troops  as  soon  as  Abderrahman  should  be  firm  upon  his 
throne. 

There  were  many  persons  who  blamed  the  policy  which 
gave  up  Candahar  when  the  English  had  once  got  posses- 
sion of  it,  but  the  English  Government  was  determined  not 
to  be  caught  again  in  the  web  of  Afghan  politics,  and  was 
satisfied  with  having  an  English  Resident  at  Cabul,  and 
English  agents  at  Candahar  and  Herat. 

Here  is  how  Sir  Lepel  Griffin  first  met  the  new  Ameer, 
about  two  days'  journey  from  Cabul :  — 

"  He  appeared  walking  slowly  and  heavily,  a  large,  Falstaffian, 
genial-looking  man,  with  bright  eyes  and  Jewish  features,  wear- 
ing the  Astrakan  fur  cap,  which  is  usual  among  Afghans  of  rank, 
and  a  blue  uniform  coat  with  gold  epaulettes,  probably  a  present 
from  one  of  his  Russian  friends  at  Tashkend.  He  saluted  me 
in  military  fashion,  and  then  shook  hands  with  much  cordiality. 
.  .  .  From  the  first  moment  that  I  saw  him  I  had  taken  a  liking 
to  him,  and  had  formed  a  most  favorable  impression  of  his  char- 
acter. His  face,  somewhat  coarse  and  heavy  in  repose,  lighted 
up.  when  he  smiled,  in  a  very  winning  fashion,  and  his  eyes  were 
full  of  fun  and  vivacity.  His  conversation  showed  him  at  once 
to  be  a  man  of  much  knowledge  of  men  and  the  world.  His  esti- 
mate of  the  persons  regarding  whom  we  conversed  was  reason- 
able and  shrewd  ;  while  through  his  whole  bearing  there  was 
clearly  visible  much  natural  good  humor  and  bonhomie.  He 
evidently  had  a  very  high,  perhaps  exaggerated,  opinion  of  his 
own  wisdom,  and  it  was  exceedingly  difficult  to  make  him  change 
his  opinion  on  any  subject  which  he  had  considered  at  all  closely. 
The  subsequent  career  of  Abderrahman  has  not  induced  me  to 
alter  materially  the  opinion  I  formed  of  him  during  our  first  in- 
terview. He  has  proved  a  stern,  determined  ruler,  and  a  most 
cruel  one,  if  judged  from  an  English  standpoint.  But  if  the 
character  of  the  Afghans  —  their  ferocity,  fanaticism,  ignorance, 
and  impatience  of  control  — be  considered,  it  will  be  admitted 
that  in  no  other  manner  could  the  Ameer  have  maintained  his 
position  and  brought  order  out  of  the  most  hopeless  and  dis- 
cordant elements  that  ever  existed  in  any  country.  The  vanity 
and  pride  of  the  man  are  phenomenal,  but  they  may  be  excused 
in  one  whose  success  has  amply  justified  his  self-confidence. 
He  has  thoroughly  understood  the  people  he  had  to  govern. 
He  has  ruled  them,  as  he  assured  me  they  alone  could  be  ruled, 

25 


386    ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

with  the  stick.  In  this  direction  he  has  certainly  shown 
extraordinary  energy ;  and  where  Ameer  Shere  Ali  beat  his 
people  with  whips,  Ameer  Abderrahman  has  scourged  them 
with  scorpions." 

The  chief  men  of  the  turbulent  clan  of  the  Ghilzees  he 
decoyed  into  his  power  and  destroyed  them  utterly.  The 
English  seated  him  on  his  throne,  relieved  Candahar,  drew 
off  the  remains  of  the  column  that  had  suffered  at  Meiwand, 
and  peaceably  withdrew  their  armies. 

The  English  within  the  last  few  years  have  established 
a  protectorate  over  Beloochistan.  Not  that  Beloochistan  is 
worth  anything,  for  it  is  as  sandy  as  the  bed  of  the  ocean ; 
but  it  contains  a  place  called  Quetta,  and  Quetta  is  supposed 
to  be  a  backdoor  to  the  possession  of  what  is  called  the  Key 
of  India,  viz.,  Herat. 


CHAPTER   XV. 

MR.    GLADSTONE. 

.  WILLIAM  EWART  GLADSTONE,  born  in  1809, 
has  been  for  more  than  sixty  years  in  political  harness, 
and  for  half  a  century  very  prominently  before  the  world. 

He  is  not  an  "  opportunist,"  —  for  opportunists  change 
their  tactics  according  to  circumstances,  without  changing 
their  convictions.  Their  course  may  be  called  a  system  of 
tacking,  —  keeping  an  end  in  view  while  apparently  steering 
away  from  it ;  but  Mr.  Gladstone's  course  has  always  followed 
strong  convictions,  —  and  those  convictions  have,  in  sixty 
years,  travelled  nearly  the  whole  round  of  views  in  politics, 
and  the  ecclesiastical  part  of  religion. 

Mr.  Gladstone's  life  has  been  purely  a  political  life,  with 
very  few  picturesque  points  in  it  to  excite  our  sympathies,  or 
break  the  monotony  of  alternate  changes  between  office  and 
the  Opposition.  Besides,  to  a  great  extent  we  have  gone 
over  the  same  ground  of  English  history  in  considering  the 
career  of  Sir  Robert  Peel,  Mr.  Gladstone's  first  leader,  and 
that  of  Lord  Beaconsfield,  his  rival ;  yet  Gladstone  had  been 
in  cabinets,  and  was  a  man  of  power  in  the  state,  while 
Beaconsfield  was  still  the  butt  of  "  Punch,"  and  a  standing 
joke  in  the  House  of  Commons. 

The  Gladstone  family,  though  fallen  in  fortunes,  was  yet 
descended  from  the  landed  gentry  of  southern  Scotland. 
Some  generations  back  his  people  were  maltsters  in  Lanark- 
shire, —  substantial,  pious,  prosperous  men.  One  of  them 
was  a  kirk  elder,  and  prominent  in  public  affairs.  Their 
successors  became  grain- merchants.  Mr.  Gladstone's  grand- 
father was  in  that  business  at  Leith,  the  port  of  Edinburgh, 
and  his  father  was  on  his  way  to  sell  a  cargo  of  wheat  at 
Liverpool  when  the  opportunity  occurred  to  him  by  which 


388    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

he  rose  from  obscurity  to  wealth  and  prominence.  His 
bearing  and  ability  so  impressed  one  of  his  fellow-travellers, 
who  was  a  partner  in  a  great  trading  firm  in  Liverpool,  that 
on  further  acquaintance  he  was  taken  into  the  house,  which 
eventually  became  the  great  firm  of  Gladstone  and  Co. 
Mr.  Gladstone  settled  in  Liverpool.  He  became  Sir  John 
Gladstone,  and  married  a  Miss  Robertson,  from  the  extreme 
north  of  Scotland,  who  claimed  descent  from  the  historian, 
from  Henry  III.,  and  from  Robert  Bruce. 

However  that  might  be,  the  Gladstones  were  distin- 
guished for  business  virtues,  integrity,  clear-sightedness, 
enterprise,  prudence,  and  thrift.  They  were  also  a  family 
possessed  of  exceptionally  good  bodily  powers. 

Sir  John  Gladstone  became  a  leading  merchant  in  Liver- 
pool, trafficking  in  all  parts  of  the  world,  and  owning  large 
sugar  plantations  in  Demerara.  He  was  an  earnest  sup- 
porter of  Mr.  Canning,  and  his  personal  friend. 

Little  William  was  three  years  old  when  Canning  was 
elected  to  Parliament  for  Liverpool.  He  was  ten  years 
older  when  Canning  became  Foreign  Secretary,  ip  1822. 
Already  Sir  John  Gladstone  loved  to  talk  politics  with  his 
clever  little  son,  and  to  instil  into  him  his  own  views  of  the 
career  of  his  friend  Canning  •  so  that  the  boy  started  in  life 
with  four  political  principles,  —  hatred  to  Turks  ;  aspirations 
for  Greeks ;  freedom  all  the  world  over ;  but  no  parliamen- 
tary reforms  at  home. 

In  1821,  when  twelve  years  old,  he  went  to  Eton,  where 
he  remained  six  years.  Any  picture  of  school-life  at  Eton 
in  his  day  is  sickening ;  yet  it  contrived  to  turn  out  some 
splendid  men.  Arthur  Hallam  was  Gladstone's  dearest 
friend.  Others  of  his  schoolfellows  whose  names  are 
known  to  us  were  Selwyn,  the  future  Bishop  of  New  Zea- 
land, Manning,  the  future  Cardinal,  and  several  other 
bishops  and  leading  men  of  name  and  fame  in  the  after 
history  of  England.  But  the  education  Eton  afforded  at  that 
day  was  very  low,  and  its  moral  training  was  such  that  it 
needed  an  exceptionally  fine  moral  nature,  like  those  of 
William  Gladstone  and  his  two  elder  brothers,  Thomas  and 


WILLIAM  E.   GLADSTONE. 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  389 

Robertson,  to  withstand  its  contaminating  influences ;  while 
its  religious  training  was  absolutely  nil. 

Gladstone's  own  tutor  was  the  Rev.  Henry  Knapp,  a 
man  as  little  "  reverend  "  as  can  be  imagined.  He  and 
another  master  were  given  to  all  sorts  of  wild  pranks,  to 
which  they  sometimes  admitted  a  favorite  pupil.  Knapp 
loved  drink  and  theatres  and  prize-fights  and  horse-races ; 
defending  his  love  for  the  last  two  by  saying  that  without 
familiarity  with  them  no  boy  could  understand  the  Olym- 
pic games.  Knapp  finally  (seven  years  after  Gladstone 
left  Eton)  got  into  disgrace  for  his  debts,  and  ended  by 
carrying  off  all  the  money  he  could  rescue  from  his  credi- 
tors, to  Elba.  He  died  in  Rome  in  1846.  It  is  to  be 
hoped  that  by  that  time  he  had  laid  to  heart  the  high  ideal 
of  a  schoolmaster  incarnated  in  Dr.  Arnold. 

The  position  of  Gladstone  under  such  a  teacher,  and  in 
an  unsatisfactory  "house,"  threw  him  upon  himself  for 
moral  culture  and  for  the  attainment  of  general  infor- 
mation. In  those  days  no  mathematics  and  no  history 
were  taught  at  Eton  ;  no  instruction  was  given  in  Scrip- 
ture or  modern  languages,  but  little  in  arthmetic,  while 
nothing  about  literature  or  science  was  then  taught.  The 
only  thing  rigorously  demanded  by  the  school  was  excel- 
lence in  making  Latin  verses,  and  a  thorough  acquaintance 
with  Homer,  Virgil,  and  Horace. 

We  may  all  be  thankful  for  the  attention  William  Glad- 
stone paid  to  Homer.  The  rest  of  his  education  he  must 
have  acquired  for  himself.  Dr.  Keate  was  the  head-master. 
He  was  a  man  noted  for  his  indiscriminate  flogging. 

"  Etonians  of  sixty  years  ago,"  says  a  writer  in  the  "  Fort- 
nightly Review,"  "were  pretty  much  what  Keate  himself  made 
them.  By  his  system  of  ignoring  mountains  and  magnifying 
molehills  ;  of  overlooking  heinous  moral  offences  and  flogging 
unmercifully  for  peccadilloes,  —  he  caused  boys  to  lose  all  sense 
of  proportion  as  to  the  delinquencies  they  committed.  What  could 
be  expected  from  such  a  system?  If  it  be  true  that  Keate  was 
in  private  life  gracious,  sensible,  and  modest,  he  is  the  more  to 
blame  for  having  done  violence  to  his  nature,  so  as  to  appear  in 


390  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

the  discharge  of  his  public  duties  a  graceless,  senseless,  cruel 
little  martinet.  Of  his  fondness  for  flogging  there  can  be  very 
little  doubt,  and  as  no  boy,  even  the  quietest  and  best-behaved, 
was  safe  from  his  capricious  rod,  a  quibbling  spirit  was  developed 
amongst  those  who  felt  themselves  to  be  in  danger  of  his  casti- 
gations,  without  having  deserved  them." 

Here  is  a  description  of  Sunday  at  Eton  in  Mr.  Glad- 
stone's time  :  — 

"  The  boys  used  to  lie  in  bed  till  nearly  ten  on  Sunday.  At 
half-past  ten  they  attended  service  in  the  chapel,  rushing  in 
helter-skelter  at  the  last  stroke  of  the  bell ;  shoving  one  another, 
laughing,  and  making  as  much  noise  as  possible.  The  noble- 
men, or  'nobs,'  and  the  sixth  form  occupied  stalls,  and  it  was 
customary  that  every  occupant  of  a  stall  should,  on  taking 
his  seat  for  the  first  time,  distribute  among  his  neighbors 
packets  of  almonds  and  raisins,  which  were  eaten  during  the 
service." 

As  I  said,  Mr.  Gladstone's  dearest  friend  at  Eton  was 
Arthur  Hallarn,  the  charm  of  whose  manners  and  conversa- 
tion seems  to  have  been  to  all  men  very  great.  "  He  had," 
says  one  who  knew  him,  "  all  the  exuberance  of  boyhood, 
with  a  feminine  sweetness  of  disposition,  and  a  judgment  of 
surprising  lucidity,  so  that,  as  Sir  Francis  Doyle  said  of 
him,  he  appeared  to  turn  the  rays  of  a  clear,  fragrant  torch 
on  any  question  that  he  touched."  Gladstone  bore  him 
great  love,  and  for  his  sake  took  little  part  in  the  athletic 
sports  of  the  school.  These  two,  and  a  few  other  boys 
of  intellectual  tastes  and  moral  purity,  linked  themselves 
in  close  companionship.  They  were  enthusiasts  at  that 
time  for  the  Greeks,  and  mourned  the  death  of  Byron  at 
Missolonghi. 

Soon  after  this  event,  Canning,  then  Minister  for  Foreign 
Affairs,  came  down  to  Eton,  and  found  time  to  have  nearly 
an  hour's  chat  with  William  Gladstone,  as  the  son  of  his  old 
friend.  That  day  made  the  deepest  impression  on  young 
William,  who  at  seventeen  years  of  age  was  beginning  to 
have  political  aspirations.  As  he  listened  to  Canning's 
advice  and  his  remarks  upon  the  leading  topics  of  the 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  391 

day,  the  impressions  made  on  him  became  lasting  and  com- 
plete. Canning  drew  pictures  of  future  progress,  under 
parliamentary  institutions,  for  Greece  and  for  the  Spanish 
republics  of  South  America,  which  he  had  taken  under  his 
protection,  —  miserable  little  weaklings  which  have  never 
justified  his  love. 

One  thing  that  Canning  said,  Gladstone  laid  deeply  to 
heart  for  use  in  future  years :  "  Give  plenty  of  time  to 
your  verses.  Every  good  copy  you  do  will  set  in  your 
memory  some  poetical  thought  or  some  well-turned  form 
of  speech  which  you  will  find  useful  when  you  speak  in 
public." 

This  visit  of  Mr.  Canning's  led  to  Gladstone's  starting 
the  "  Eton  Miscellany,"  as  Canning  had  started  the  "  Micro- 
cosm "  in  his  Eton  days.  The  editorial  productions  in  the 
"  Eton  Miscellany  "  were  most  extraordinary.  "  Here,"  says 
the  writer  in  the  "  Fortnightly  Review,"  "  was  a  set  of  boys, 
living  under  the  rod  of  a  pompous,  tyrannical  doctor  of 
divinity,  who  yet  were  allowed  a  liberty  not  enjoyed  by  the 
greatest  thinkers  elsewhere,  of  pronouncing  condemnation 
on  the  rulers  of  their  country." 

Mr.  Gladstone's  own  Ode  on  Wat  Tyler  is  an  amazing 
production.  Here  is  one  of  its  verses.  Thistlewood  and 
Ings  the  butcher  had  been  hanged  in  1820  for  conspiracy 
to  murder  all  the  ministers,  including  the  Duke  of  Welling- 
ton and  Mr.  Canning.1  The  poem  would  be  rather  strong 
in  these  days,  even  for  a  Nihilist  publication. 

"  I  hymn  the  gallant  and  the  good, 
From  Tyler  down  to  Thistlewood  ; 
My  Muse  the  trophies  grateful  sings, 
The  deeds  of  Miller  and  of  Ings. 
She  sings  of  all  who,  soon  or  late, 

Have  burst  subjection's  iron  chain  ; 

Have  sealed  the  bloody  despot's  fate, 

Or  cleft  a  peer  or  priest  in  twain  !  " 

And  here  is  another  poem  by  a  pessimist  contributor  on 
Ireland  :  — 

1  Canning  was  then  President  of  the  Board  of  Control,  but  resigned 
before  the  Queen's  trial. 


392   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  Thus  I  thy  destined  woes  reveal, 
Which  Fate  forbids  me  to  conceal. 
I  see  no  beam  of  cheery  light 
To  dissipate  the  shades  of  night. 
Through  unborn  ages  thou  shall  be 
One  round  of  endless  misery." 

And  Dr.  Keate  did  not  utter  one  word  of  censure  on  these 
poems  ! 

It  is  fair,  however,  to  say  that  Gladstone's  prose  contribu- 
tions to  the  "Miscellany"  by  no  means  breathed  the  same 
sentiments  as  his  Nihilistic  ode.  His  eulogy  on  Canning 
when  he  died  was  beautiful.  Arthur  Hallam,  too,  con- 
tributed some  charming  little  poems,  —  the  "  Death  of  a 
Charger  "  and  "  The  Battle  of  the  Boyne." 

Towards  the  close  of  Gladstone's  school  career,  Keate 
became  very  proud  of  him  ;  and  Gladstone  founded  a  de- 
bating society  which  drew  the  attention  of  the  elder  boys 
to  public  speaking,  literature,  and  politics.  Indeed,  Glad- 
stone had  been  trained  to  debating  in  his  own  home,  where, 
a  visitor  has  told  us,  "  the  children  and  the  parents  argued 
upon  everything."  He  instances  a  debate  on  whether 
Thomas  Gladstone  had  any  right  to  kill  a  wasp  he  had 
knocked  down  with  his  handkerchief;  the  end  of  which  was 
that  the  wasp  escaped  during  the  discussion. 

One  thing  which  Sir  John  Gladstone  inculcated  on  all  his 
boys  was  to  finish  a  thing  begun,  and  to  do  it  thoroughly. 
This  quality  young  William  took  with  him  to  Oxford,  whither 
he  went  in  1829. 

There  among  his  associates  were  Charles  Wordsworth 
(subsequently  a  bishop),  Cardinal  Manning,  Tait  (after- 
wards Archbishop  of  Canterbury),  Sir  Francis  Doyle,  and 
other  future  celebrities.  In  1827,  Keble  had  just  published 
"The  Christian  Year,"  and  Canning  had  thrown  the  uni- 
versities into  a  ferment  by  his  proposed  measures  for  grant- 
ing civil  liberties  to  Catholics.  Politics  ran  very  high  at 
Oxford,  mingled  with  much  disloyalty  and  irreligiousness. 
One  young  student  (subsequently  a  hard-working  High- 
Church  clergyman)  had  as  a  little  ornament  on  his  mantel- 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  393 

piece  a  model  guillotine.  On  the  head  of  his  college  de- 
manding what  this  meant,  he  answered  that  it  was  an 
instrument  to  kill  rats  with,  —  a  covert  allusion  to  Hano- 
verian rats,  the  cant  phrase  for  the  line  of  Hanoverian  kings. 

Gladstone  at  Oxford  was  counted  one  of  the  Tories,  who 
were  a  majority  among  the  undergraduates.  He  had  re- 
nounced by  this  time  his  admiration  for  Tyler,  Ings,  and 
Thistlewood,  and  pointed  out  how  the  disturbances  of  1830 
on  the  Continent  furnished  proof  that  all  monarchical  and 
ecclesiastical  institutions  were  menaced  by  the  new  spirit  of 
the  age. 

In  1832,  when  the  Reform  Bill  was  first  agitated,  Glad- 
stone got  up  the  Oxford  Anti-Reform  League,  in  company 
with  two  others,  one  of  them  Lord  Lincoln. 

The  great  debating  society  at  Oxford  is  the  Union,  and 
to  this  Mr.  Gladstone  was  elected  as  soon  as  he  was  eligible. 
Members  soon  began  to  remark  the  singular  excellence, 
volume,  and  clearness  of  his  voice,  which  added  immensely 
to  his  powers  as  a  speaker. 

He  was  known  at  Oxford  as  a  religious  man,  one  excep- 
tionally regular  in  attendance  at  the  University  sermons  at 
St.  Mary's  and  at  "Chapels."  He  was  regular  at  Burton's 
Lectures  on  Divinity,  and  at  Pusey's  Lectures  on  Hebrew. 
He  went  many  times  to  hear  Rowland  Hill,  a  great  Methodist 
preacher,  and  Dr.  Chalmers,  the  Presbyterian,  when  preach- 
ing at  chapels  of  their  own  denominations ;  and  braved  the 
risk  of  being  expelled  for  doing  so. 

At  the  final  examination,  Gladstone,  as  Sir  Robert  Peel  had 
done,  took  a  double-first,  —  first  class  in  classics,  first  class  in 
mathematics  also.  Cardinal  Manning  at  the  same  examina- 
tion took  a  classical  first.  Gladstone  had  learned  all  his 
mathematics,  besides  optics,  hydrostatics,  trigonometry,  and 
something  of  astronomy,  during  his  residence  at  Oxford. 
His  University  honors  helped  greatly  to  give  him  a  start  in 
public  life. 

Immediately  after  the  examination  he  went  with  his  friend 
Lord  Lincoln  (in  conjunction  with  whom  he  had  formed 
the  Oxford  Anti-Reform  League)  to  visit  Lord  Lincoln's 


394  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

father,  the  Duke  of  Newcastle.  The  Duke  had  the  pocket- 
borough  of  Newark  then  vacant,  and  put  Mr.  Gladstone  at 
once  into  Parliament. 

The  ballot,  universal  suffrage,  and  a  national  guard  were 
the  Tory  bugbears  at  that  period.  Thirty  years  later, 
Gladstone,  whom  the  idea  of  these  things  horrified  in  1835, 
had  fathered  the  ballot,  more  than  doubled  the  number  of 
English  voters,  and  promoted  the  raising  throughout  the 
country  of  an  immense  army  of  volunteers. 

Gladstone  had  made  a  brilliant  speech  in  the  Union 
against  Parliamentary  Reform,  and  it  was  this  speech  which 
caused  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  to  regard  him  with  great 
interest  as  a  rising  politician.  When  he  was  made  mem- 
ber for  Newark,  Lord  Lincoln  was  elected  for  South 
Nottingham. 

Gladstone's  maiden  speech  in  Parliament  was  made  in 
defence  of  his  father's  interests  as  the  owner  of  large 
sugar  estates  and  many  slaves  in  Demerara.  He  depre- 
cated immediate  emancipation,  and  prophesied  that  it 
would  not  yield  the  beneficial  results  its  friends  expected 
from  it. 

An  old  man,  speaking  of  the  great  change  in  Mr.  Glad- 
stone's politics  from  High  Toryism  in  1834  to  advanced 
Radicalism  at  the  present  day,  has  said :  — 

"  I  hardly  see  that  he  has  changed  more  than  a  man  would  do 
who  swims  with  the  tide.  The  change  occasioned  in  England 
by  the  railways  between  1830  and  1845  was  wonderful.  Then 
you  must  not  forget  the  accession  of  the  Queen,  which  put 
a  stop  to  disloyalty  almost  entirely.  Before  she  came  to  the 
throne,  numbers  of  men  belonging  to  Whig  families  were  quite 
ready  to  become  Republicans.  It  was  this  growing  republican- 
ism which  gave  so  much  uneasiness  to  young  men  like  Glad- 
stone, who  dissociated  the  idea  of  monarchy  from  the  personality 
of  kings.  As  soon  as  Queen  Victoria  ascended  the  throne  the 
change  in  public  opinion  was  almost  incredible.  And  the  re- 
storation of  the  people's  affections  towards  their  sovereign, 
gave  reformers  much  firmer  standing  ground  than  they  pos- 
sessed before.  They  took  up  a  position  which  proved  that  what 
they  aimed  at  was  reform,  not  revolution." 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  395 

All  this  is  true  ;  but  equally  true  is  the  indictment  drawn 
up  against  Mr.  Gladstone  by  Mademoiselle  Marie  Dronsart, 
a  recent  French  critic  of  the  late  Premier's  career. 

"Mr.  Gladstone  has  touched  everything,  and  disturbed  all  he 
touched.  As  his  friend  Wilberforce  predicted,  he  has  labored 
to  destroy  everything  that  once  was  dear  to  him.  He  has  im- 
perilled the  Church,  whose  most  dutiful  servant  he  still  claims 
to  be  ;  the  throne,  '  the  most  illustrious  on  earth,'  as  he  wrote 
to  the  poor  young  Duke  of  Clarence  ;  the  unity  of  the  empire, 
which  he  says  is  part  of  his  being,  of  his  flesh  and  of  his  blood  ; 
the  House  of  Lords,  which  is  part  of  the  industrial  machinery 
of  the  Constitution,  and  which,  according  to  Mr.  Russell,  he 
respects.  He  has  stimulated  the  war  of  classes  as  it  has  never 
before  been  stimulated  in  England  ;  he  has  attacked  the  prin- 
ciples on  which  property  is  based,  and  sown  dissension  from  a 
full  hand,  while  he  has  preached  peace  and  good-will." 

We  shall  see  in  the  remainder  of  this  brief  sketch  how, 
during  the  course  of  his  long  life,  he  has  led  his  followers  to 
support  him  in  the  accomplishment  of  these  things. 

He  entered  Parliament  as  the  devoted  adherent  of  Sir 
Robert  Peel,  who  by  his  great  knowledge  of  the  world, 
his  patriotism,  and  his  strong  religious  principle,  seemed  to 
his  disciples  the  incarnation  of  statesmanship. 

Gladstone  followed  Peel  through  the  grievous  ordeal  of  the 
separation  of  the  Conservatives  from  the  High  Tories  on  the 
question  of  the  Corn  Laws.  In  Gladstone's  case,  his  fidelity 
to  his  leader  was  made  bitter  by  estrangement  from  the 
father  who  adored  him,  and  who  exclaimed,  with  pain  and 
indignation,  "  There  's  my  son  William  helping  to  ruin  his 
country  !  "  As  his  course  was  not  that  which  met  the  views 
of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle,  his  patron,  he  conceived  himself 
bound  in  honor  to  resign  his  seat  for  Newark,  the  Duke's 
borough.  But  he  brought  over  Lord  Lincoln  to  his  way  of 
thinking,  and  the  Duke's  wrath  was  unspeakable  against 
them  both.  All  this  took  place  in  1846,  the  year  of 
Disraeli's  rise  to  political  prestige  and  influence. 

Almost  from  the  time  when  he  had  entered  Parliament, 
Gladstone  had  been  a  sub-officer  in  the  cabinet  whenever 
Peel  was  in  power;  but  when,  in  1845,  a^  England  was 


396    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY, 

agitated  by  Peel's  proposal  to  grant  a  larger  subsidy  for  the 
education  of  Roman  Catholic  priests  at  the  College  of 
Maynooth  than  had  ever  been  done  before,  Mr.  Gladstone 
earnestly  opposed  the  measure,  and  wrote  a  pamphlet  to 
express  his  views.  The  argument  used  by  the  Government, 
when  advocating  the  Maynooth  Grant,  was  that  if  the  Irish 
priests  were  well  educated,  and  in  their  own  country,  they 
would  exercise  a  more  enlightened  influence  upon  the  Irish 
peasantry.  Mr.  Gladstone  resigned  his  position  in  the  min- 
istry in  consequence.  But  when  we  con'sider  his  after  career, 
it  is  strange  to  find  him,  at  the  age  of  thirty-six,  voting  in 
opposition  to  Irish  feeling,  and  in  support  of  the  prejudices 
of  the  Established  Church  in  Ireland,  whose  interests  he 
has  since  most  bitterly  and  most  successfully  opposed. 

In  1837,  he  tried  to  get  back  into  Parliament  as  Conser- 
vative member  for  Oxford ;  but  although  he  had  published 
two  pamphlets  in  defence  of  the  Church  of  England  as  an 
Established  Church  in  Ireland,  he  did  not  succeed.  He, 
however,  obtained  a  seat  elsewhere. 

In  1850,  Mr.  Gladstone  visited  Naples.  There,  the  hor- 
rors of  the  rule  of  King  Ferdinand  II.,  nicknamed  "  King 
Bomba,"  and  the  atrocities  perpetrated  in  his  prisons,  struck 
him  so  forcibly  that,  on  his  return,  he  published  two  letters 
on  the  subject,  written  to  Lord  Aberdeen,  which  excited 
public  feeling  to  the  highest  point  both  in  England  and 
America.  The  story  that  most  moved  men's  hearts  was 
that  of  Carlo  Poerio.  That  gentleman's  father  had  been  a 
distinguished  lawyer  in  Naples.  He  himself  was  a  man  of 
the  highest  personal  character,  and  of  many  accomplish- 
ments. He  was  no  revolutionist  in  the  Mazzini  sense,  but  a 
constitutionalist,  a  firm  friend  of  the  monarchy ;  and  when 
the  King  swore  publicly  to  adhere  to  the  Constitution,  on 
January  7,  1848,  Poerio  became  one  of  his  ministers,  appar- 
ently the  most  trusted  and  beloved.  In  July,  1849,  the  tide 
had  turned.  The  King  tore  up  the  Constitution,  and  deter- 
mined to  get  rid  of  all  those  who,  by  ability,  high  character, 
and  familiarity  with  public  affairs,  might  reproach  him  with 
his  treachery.  Poerio  was  one  of  the  first  arrested,  on  some 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  397 

frivolous  pretext  and  on  the  evidence  of  forged  letters. 
With  forty- two  others,  he  was  tried  for  an  imaginary  con- 
spiracy. That  the  principal  witness  was  swearing  falsely, 
Poerio  again  and  again  brought  home  to  him,  but  with  no 
result.  He  was  condemned  to  twenty- four  years'  imprison- 
ment, and  sent  to  the  Island  of  Nisida.  There  eight  hundred 
criminals  were  confined,  who  had  never  been  in  chains  ;  but 
orders  came  direct  from  the  King  thenceforward  to  chain 
all  the  prisoners.  Sixteen  of  them,  when  Mr.  Gladstone 
visited  the  prison,  were  confined  in  a  room  less  than  six- 
teen feet  long,  ten  or  twelve  broad,  and  ten  high,  with  a 
small  yard.  They  were  chained  two  and  two,  —  informer 
with  victim,  criminal  with  gentleman.  The  chains  were 
never  removed,  day  or  night,  for  one  moment. 

"  I  do  not  expect  my  health  can  stand  it  long,"  said 
Poerio  to  Mr.  Gladstone ;  "  but  may  God  give  me  patience 
to  endure  !  " 

From  Nisida,  Poerio  was  removed  to  Ischia.  There  he 
was  confined  in  an  underground  dungeon,  and  chained  to 
the  floor.  His  resource  was  in  trying  to  remember  Dante's 
Divina  Commedia,  a  large  part  of  which  his  memory  had 
laid  up  in  store.  At  Ischia,  Mr.  Gladstone's  pamphlet  left 
him ;  and  at  Ischia,  Ruffini's  wonderful  novel  leaves  Dr. 
Antonio. 

In  1859  —  nine  years  after  —  Poerio  was  set  at  liberty, 
and  embarked  for  America.  He  contrived,  however,  to 
change  his  destination,  reached  London,  and  thence  returned 
to  Italy. 

By  his  pen,  and  in  his  place  in  Parliament,  Mr.  Gladstone 
had  done  his  utmost  for  the  liberation  of  the  victims  of  the 
King  of  Naples. 

In  1858,  when  Lord  Derby  was  Prime  Minister,  and  Sir 
Edward  Bulwer  Lytton  was  Secretary  for  the  Colonies, 
they  sent  Mr.  Gladstone  to  the  Ionian  Isles  to  look  after 
the  affairs  of  that  dissatisfied  little  republic,  placed  by  the 
Congress  of  Vienna  under  the  protectorate  of  England. 
The  islanders  had  no  fault  to  find  with  the  material  advan- 
tages of  that  protectorate.  Much  English  money  was 


398   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

spent  among  them,  they  had  good  justice,  and  good 
roads ;  but  Greeks  are  Greeks,  and  they  desired  to  be 
reunited  to  other  Greeks,  under  a  Greek  king.  Mr.  Glad- 
stone, who  was  only  sent  out  to  investigate,  was  hailed  as 
a  liberator.  His  report  as  Lord  High  Commissioner  was 
such  that  the  Government  decided  to  take  the  earliest 
opportunity  of  making  England's  rights  in  the  islands  a 
present  to  the  Greek  Crown.  This  opportunity  occurred 
about  five  years  later,  when  Prince  George  of  Denmark, 
brother  of  the  Princess  of  Wales,  was  called  to  the  Greek 
throne. 

Under  Lord  Aberdeen,  in  1852,  Mr.  Gladstone,  after  his 
return  from  his  Ionian  mission,  was  made  Chancellor  of 
the  Exchequer,  and  he  remained  in  office  until  the  cabinet 
of  Lord  Aberdeen  dropped  to  pieces,  under  the  stress  and 
strain  of  the  Crimean  war.  During  that  time  we  find  the 
Mr.  Gladstone  6f  the  first  half  of  his  parliamentary  life 
opposed  to  the  Mr.  Gladstone  of  the  second..  He  was  in 
alliance  with  the  Turks,  and  opposed  to  Russia. 

Mr.  Gladstone's  course  in  Parliament  from  1*855  to  1860 
was  somewhat  erratic.  His  friends  called  it  incomprehen- 
sible. "  I  cannot  make  out  Gladstone,"  said  one  of  them. 
He  would  —  and  he  would  not  —  join  the  ministries  of 
Lord  Derby  and  Lord  Palmerston.  He  deprecated  the 
continuance  of  the  war  with  Russia,  after  having  taken  a 
leading  part  in  the  cabinet  that  brought  it  on. 

In  1860,  however,  he  had  decided  to  be  no  longer  a 
Conservative,  but  a  member  of  the  Whig  party,  and  the 
declared  opponent  of  Mr.  Disraeli,  who  had  just  been 
defeated  on  the  subject  of  a  new  Reform  Bill. 

Two  years  before  this,  when  Lord  High  Commissioner 
to  the  Ionian  Isles,  and  treading  the  soil  of  Ithaca,  in  the 
very  footsteps  of  Ulysses,  Mr.  Gladstone  had  re-devoted 
himself  to  the  study  of  Homer,  the  beloved  poet  of  his 
early  youth.  His  contributions  to  Homeric  literature  must 
endear  him  to  every  one  who  has  any  enthusiasm  for  him 
who,  Virgil  told  Dante  when  they  met  his  shade,  in  the 
Inferno,  had  been  "suckled  at  the  Muses'  breasts;  "  while 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  399 

the  poets  who  surrounded  him  cried  out  that  he  was 
"  sovereign  of  them  all."  Nothing  made  Gladstone  more 
angry  than  to  hear  any  one  advance  Wolff's  theory  attack- 
ing the  personality  of  Homer,  unless  it  were  to  hear  any 
one  attack  the  personality  of  Shakespeare. 

"Few  men,"  says  one  critic,  "have  known  the  Iliad  better. 
He  knows  it  not  merely  as  a  work  of  art,  but  as  an  anatomist 
knows  the  human  body.  He  is  familiar  with  every  epithet, 
every  metaphor,  every  turn  of  expression.  He  has  brought  to 
bear  on  it  the  keenest  observation  and  the  most  patient  experi- 
ments, and  has  delighted  in  announcing  to  the  world  his  dis- 
coveries, with  almost  boyish  enthusiasm." 

Mr.  Gladstone's  books  on  the  Iliad,  and  his  "Juven- 
tus  Mundi"  (The  Youth  of  the  World)  are  delightful. 
He  has  also  made  English  ballads  of  some  parts  of 
the  Iliad,  as  Dr.  Maginn  made  of  some  parts  of  the 
Odyssey. 

It  is  the  poetic  temperament  in  Mr.  Gladstone,  stimu- 
lated by  his  loving  intimacy  with  the  greatest  of  poets, 
that  gives  him  his  power  of  sympathy  with  what  is  passing 
in  the  world.  Anything  that  stirs  the  public  heart  stirs 
his ;  whether  it  be  a  book  like  "  Robert  Elsmere,"  or  some 
great  event.  His  heart  burns  within  him  to  tell  us  what  he 
thinks  of  it,  and  what  he  thinks  we  ought  to  think.  "  Like 
one  of  his  Homeric  heroes,  his  soul  takes  fire  when  he  hears 
the  noise  of  shouting  in  the  camp,  and  the  clattering  of 
spears  and  brazen  armor." 

Mr.  Gladstone  made  an  excellent  Chancellor  of  the 
Exchequer  in  Lord  Palmerston's  cabinet  of  1859,  and  was 
considered  the  strongest  financier  in  the  country.  His 
policy  was  that  of  Sir  Robert  Peel.  To  remove  import 
duties  he  considered  would  be  to  give  a  stimulus  to  trade. 
In  1862,  he  believed  in  the  coming  success  of  the  Confed- 
erate States,  for  which  in  England  he  has  been  greatly 
blamed  by  those  who  thought  otherwise.  As  before  the 
battle  of  Gettysburg,  a  very  high  official  at  Washington 
privately  expressed  the  same  opinion,, — the  same  fear, — 


4<DO  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

it  does  not  do  to  be  too  hard  on  the  prevision  of  an 
English  statesman. 

In  1865,  Mr.  Gladstone  first  intermeddled  in  the  great 
questions  of  Irish  affairs.  In  1866,  things  there  had  come 
to  such  a  pass  that  the  Habeas  Corpus  Act  was  suspended, 
and  Mr.  Bright  appealed  to  Mr.  Gladstone  and  Mr.  Disraeli, 
as  the  trusted  leaders  of  the  two  great  parties,  to  suspend 
their  quarrels  and  see  what  could  be  done  for  the  pacifica- 
tion of  Ireland.  Mr.  Bright,  twenty  years  after,  when  a  very 
old  man,  by  no  means  approved  of  the  aid  he  had  invoked. 
This  was  after  Mr.  Gladstone  became  identified  with  Home 
Rule  measures. 

In  1866,  however,  events,  as  well  as  Mr.  Bright,  seemed 
to  call  on  Mr.  Gladstone  to  "do  something."  After  his 
rejection  by  the  University  of  Oxford  as  its  member,  he 
declared  himself  "unmuzzled,"  —  free  to  act,  free  to  put 
his  speculative  theories  into  practice. 

It  was  about  this  time  that  Mr.  Kinglake  wrote  of  him  : 

"If  Mr.  Gladstone  was  famous  among  us  for  the  splendor  of 
his  eloquence,  his  unaffected  piety,  and  for  his  blameless  life, 
he  was  also  celebrated  far  and  wide  for  a  more  than  common 
liveliness  of  conscience.  He  had  once  imagined  it  to  be  his 
duty  to  quit  a  Government,  and  to  burst  through  strong  ties  of 
friendship  and  gratitude,  by  reason  of  a  thin  shade  of  difference 
on  the  subject  of  white  or  brown  sugar.  .  .  .  His  friends  lived 
in  dread  of  his  virtues,  as  tending  to  make  him  whimsical  and 
unstable;  and  the  practical  politicians,  perceiving  he  was  not 
to  be  depended"  on  for  party  purposes,  and  was  bent  upon  none 
but  lofty  objects,  used  to  look  upon  him  as  dangerous,  used 
to  call  him  behind  his  back  —  a  good  man,  in  the  worst  sense 
of  the  term." 

At  about  the  same  date  Sir  Henry  Taylor  said  of  him  : 
"  I  rather  like  Gladstone ;  but  he  is  said  to  have  more  of 
the  devil  in  him  than  appears,  —  in  a  virtuous  way,  that  is, 
—  only  self-willed." 

He  was  Prime  Minister  from  1868  to  the  early  part  of 
February,  1874,  and  Mr.  Bright  was  in  his  cabinet.  During 
those  five  years  (whether  for  better  or  worse)  a  number  of 
time-honored  institutions  were  overthrown. 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  401 

These  years  were  distinguished  by  six  measures,  all  sup- 
ported by  the  Government,  some  of  which  were  iconoclastic 
in  many  people's  eyes  :  — 

1.  The   Disestablishment  of  the  Church  of  England  in 
Ireland. 

2.  A  Tenant's  Rights  Bill  in  Ireland,  by  which  Govern- 
ment authorities  were  to  fix  the  rent  of  any  farm,  concern- 
ing which  they  were  applied  to,  for  fifteen  years ;  and  at 
the  end  of  that  time,  if  the  tenant  wished  to  give  up  his 
holding,  the  value  of  the  improvements  he  had  made  were 
to  be  paid  for  by  the  landowner. 

3.  Elementary  national  education  was  to  be  improved 
in  England ;   ratepayers  were  to  be  taxed  to  support  the 
Government  schools;  and  Government  inspectors  were  to 
visit  all  schools  that  accepted  Government  assistance. 

4.  Officers  in  the  army  might  no  longer  purchase  their 
commissions.     Before   this  time,   if  an  officer  desired  to 
part  with  his  commission,  he  might  sell  it  to  any  qualified 
officer  in  the  grade  of  rank  beneath  him.     If  he  died  in 
the  service,  his  commission  lapsed  to  the  Government,  but 
his  widow  and  children  were  pensioned. 

5.  An  act  abolishing  religious  tests  in  the  Universities 
was  passed  in  1871. 

6.  The  ballot,  guarded  by  many  precautions  to  secure 
secrecy,  was  granted. 

The  years  from  1866  to  1874  were  prosperous.  The  har- 
vests were  good,  and  the  revenue  was  satisfactory ;  but  dis- 
contents in  many  quarters  were  occasioned  by  these  changes, 
and  in  1874  a  crisis  arrived.  Then  came  a  dissolution  of 
Parliament,  then  a  General  Election,  and  then  Mr.  Glad- 
stone and  the  Liberal  party  sustained  a  total  defeat.  Mr. 
Disraeli,  with  his  imperial  policy,  came  into  power,  and 
remained  Prime  Minister  of  England  until  the  year 
1880. 

And  here,  before  we  go  on  with  Mr.  Gladstone's  political 
history,  we  will  take  a  brief  review  of  his  private  affairs. 
He  had  married  the  daughter  and  heiress  of  Sir  Stephen 
Richard  Glynne,  Baronet,  at  whose  death  in  this  year,  1874, 

26 


402    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Hawarden  Castle,  in  Wales,  not  far  from  Chester,  came  into 
possession  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Gladstone.  Hawarden  is  pro- 
nounced "  Harden  "  by  those  connected  with  it.  There  are 
two  castles  at  Hawarden,  the  old  and  the  new.  The  "  old  " 
is  now  only  an  ivy-covered  ruin ;  it  dates  long  before  the 
Norman  Conquest,  and  has  many  traditions.  The  Con- 
queror gave  it  to  one  of  his  followers,  and  it  afterwards 
belonged  to  the  stewards  of  the  principality  of  Chester. 
In  it  the  Welsh  Princes  Llwellyn  and  David  performed 
some  of  their  last  acts  of  sovereignty.  The  Earls  of  Derby 
held  it  afterwards ;  and  after  the  battle  of  Worcester,  as  is 
told  in  "  Peveril  of  the  Peak,"  the  Earl  of  that  period  was 
beheaded,  and  a  lawyer,  Serjeant  Glynne,  an  ancestor  of 
Mrs.  Gladstone,  received  it  from  the  Parliament. 

The  "  modern "  castle  is  not  a  castle,  but  a  beautiful 
house,  with  noble  trees  and  home-like  rooms,  and  books  in 
every  direction.  The  rector  of  Hawarden  receives  ,£4,000 
a  year,  and  the  position  was  given  by  Mr.  Gladstone  to 
the  Rev.  Stephen  Gladstone,  his  son.  Always,  when  at 
Hawarden,  until  his  eyesight  failed,  M*r.  Gladstone  read 
to  the  congregation  the  Sunday  lessons  ;  and  this  attracted 
to  Hawarden  Church  many  travelling  strangers.  The 
church  is  unpewed,  —  all  the  congregation  sitting  on 
uncushioned  benches. 

In  1873  occurred  a  celebrated  trial,  about  which,  as  we 
are  treating  of  England  at  that  period,  I  may  be  permitted 
to  say  a  few  words.  The  affair  lasted  one  hundred  and 
three  days,  and  created  more  interest  than  reform  bills, 
Irish  land  tenure,  or  improvements  in  education.  It  was 
curious  in  a  social  point  of  view,  because  of  the  anomalous, 
unreasonable  class-interest  taken  in  it  by  the  English  lower 
orders. 

The  Tichbornes  were  an  old  and  very  distinguished 
Catholic  family,  living  on  the  borders  of  the  New  Forest. 
One  of  the  family,  a  young  man  who  had  conspired  to 
assist  the  escape  of  Mary  Queen  of  Scotts,  had  been  put  to 
death  by  Queen  Elizabeth,  and  wrote  some  touching  lines 
in  the  Tower  the  night  before  his  execution :  — 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  403 

"  My  prime  of  life  is  but  a  frost  of  cares, 
My  feast  of  joy  is  but  a  dish  of  pain, 
My  crop  of  corn  is  but  a  field  of  tares, 

And  all  my  good  is  but  vain  hope  of  gain. 
The  day  is  past,  and  yet  I  saw  no  sun  ; 
And  now  I  live,  and  now  my  life  is  done." 

There  was  a  custom  of  great  antiquity  connected  with 
the  family,  and  a  family  ghost  haunted  the  Forest.  In 
1854,  the  Baronet,  Sir  Edward,  had  no  son.  His  heir  was 
a  Mr.  James  Tichborne,  who  had  married  a  lady  born  and 
brought  up  in  France.  She  was  a  flighty,  eccentric  woman, 
and  the  marriage  was  not  a  happy  one.  Their  son,  Roger, 
was  a  shy,  whimsical,  impulsive,  weak  young  man,  who  had 
been  educated  in  a  sort  of  haphazard  way,  —  partly  in 
France,  and  partly  at  the  Jesuits'  College  at  Stonyhurst. 
He  was  put  into  the  army,  and  joined  his  regiment  at  Dub- 
lin, where  his  broken  English  and  some  queer  ways  exposed 
him  to  rough  jesting  in  the  mess-room  •  but  upon  the  whole 
he  made  an  efficient  officer,  and  was  considered  rather  a 
good  fellow.  However,  his  home  was  so  uncomfortable, 
owing  to  the  quarrels  of  his  parents,  that  he  passed  any 
spare  time  he  had  at  Tichborne  Hall.  Sir  Edward  had 
changed  his  name,  for  some  reason,  to  Doughty,  and  was 
anxious  to  marry  his  daughter,  Miss  Kate  Doughty,  to  the 
young  man,  who  would  be  eventually  heir  to  his  estates  and 
title.  The  cousins  were  engaged,  and  were  to  be  married 
in  two  years,  during  which  interval  young  Roger  was  to 
travel.  He  reached  Valparaiso  in  June,  1853,  crossed  the 
Andes,  and  visited  Buenos  Ayres.  In  February,  1854,  he 
wrote  several  letters,  dwelling  affectionately  on  his  hopes 
when  he  should  return  home,  and  soon  after  he  went  to 
Rio,  where  he  embarked  in  the  "  Bella,"  a  little  sailing-vessel, 
for  New  York.  The  "  Bella  "  was  never  more  heard  of;  her 
boat  was  picked  up  bottom  upwards ;  and  on  the  death  of 
Sir  Edward  and  of  Roger's  father,  the  baronetcy  and  estates 
went  to  an  infant  heir. 

But  Roger's  mother  cherished  a  delusion  that  her  son  had 
been  picked  up  at  sea  and  carried  to  Australia.  She  got 


404    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

this  story  from  a  sailor  who  came  begging  to  her  door. 
She  put  advertisements  for  her  lost  son  in  all  the  Australian 
papers,  and  these  in  time  produced  an  answer  from  a 
butcher,  Arthur  Orton,  who  had  met  Roger  Tichborne  in 
Valparaiso,  and  learned  something  of  his  history.  This  man 
claimed  the  title  and  estates  of  Tichborne  as  the  real  Sir 
Roger.  He  came  to  England,  learned  all  he  could  through 
some  old  servants  of  the  Tichborne  family,  interviewed 
Roger's  mother  in  Paris,  after  showing  some  reluctance  to 
do  so,  and  was  rapturously  received  by  her  as  her  son. 

On  the  trial  he  proved  to  know  nothing  of  Stonyhurst, 
where  he  had  been  educated,  or  of  the  studies  there.  He 
could  not  speak  French,  but  spoke  Spanish,  which  Roger 
had  never  known  ;  knew  nothing  of  cavalry  drill  (Roger  had 
been  a  cavalry  officer),  but  was  well  acquainted  with  infan- 
try tactics.  On  every  point  his  case  broke  down ;  and,  after 
a  second  trial  for  perjury,  he  was  sentenced  to  penal  servi- 
tude. For  years  his  believers  were  appealed  to  to  support 
his  wife,  an  Australian  woman  of  indifferent  character,  and 
her  children.  They  and  their  claims  are  now  forgotten ; 
but  for  a  long  time  the  cruel  treatment  of  a  poor  man  by  the 
proud  aristocracy  of  England  was  a  bitter  cause  of  hatred 
against  the  great,  among  the  lower  classes.  By  what  queer 
process  of  reasoning  they  made  themselves  out  to  be  of  the 
same  class  in  life  with  Sir  Roger  Tichborne  (if  the  Claimant 
was  a  baronet  kept  out  of  his  rights) ,  it  is  impossible  to  say. 

This  episode  of  the  Tichborne  case  has  been  long,  and 
does  not  appear  to  have  much  connection  with  Mr.  Glad- 
stone ;  it  occurred  during  his  premiership,  and  absorbed 
public  interest  in  England  for  more  than  a  year. 

From  1874,  when  Mr.  Gladstone's  ministry  went  out  of 
office,  he  assumed  the  position  of  the  champion  of  Ireland ; 
and  no  knight  errant  ever  threw  himself  with  more  passion- 
ate sympathy  into  a  favorite  cause. 

In  a  recent  novel  by  Mr.  N orris  a  character  is  intro- 
duced who  undertakes  to  expound  Home  Rule  in  fifteen 
minutes.  I  can  attempt  no  similar  feat.  Very  briefly  I 
will  say  that  the  first  duty  of  an  English  Government  is  to 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  405 

maintain  the  welfare  and  integrity  of  the  British  Empire. 
The  demand  for  Home  Parliaments  (answering  to  the  State 
Legislatures  in  this  country)  has  been  granted  to  distant 
colonies,  and  could  very  well  be  conceded  to  Ireland,  were 
she  a  thousand  miles  from  the  English  shores.  But  lying 
where  she  does,  turbulent  as  her  people  are  disposed  to  be, 
and,  above  all,  after  the  proofs  given  in  1793,  1798,  and 
1848  of  the  desire  of  her  population  to  ally  itself  with 
France  or  any  other  country  that  may  engage  in  war  with 
England,  the  experiment  might  be  hazardous  in  the  ex- 
treme. But  Mr.  Gladstone  willed  Home  Rule,  and  his  life 
is  now  too  far  advanced  to  make  it  probable  he  will  ever 
on  this  subject  change  his  views. 

As  regarded  the  disestablishment  of  the  English  Church 
in  Ireland,  many  men  of  ardent  piety  and  devoted  High- 
Church  Anglicans  were  content  to  have  it  so.  They  did 
not  believe  that  the  cause  of  God  or  of  the  Church  could 
be  furthered  by  injustice,  upheld  by  police  and  military 
force. 

The  Church  of  England  in  Ireland  had  assumed  all 
churches  and  parish  buildings  once  belonging  to  the 
Roman  Catholics,  and  it  was  supported  by  tithes.  Dis- 
establishment meant,  not  that  the  tithes  were  to  be  turned 
over  to  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  but  that  they  were 
to  be  collected,  and  spent  in  endowing  secular  institutions 
for  the  benefit  of  the  people.  Once  an  enthusiastic  advo- 
cate of  the  Irish  Church  as  connected  with  the  State,  Mr. 
Gladstone  believed  in  1871  that  its  supremacy  could  not 
be  perpetuated  without  gross  injustice.  The  Anglican 
rectors  of  parishes  retain  church  buildings ;  but  in  other 
respects  the  English  Church  is  placed  on  the  same  vol- 
untary system  as  are  the  chapels  of  Roman  Catholics  or 
Protestant  Dissenters. 

In  1880,  Mr.  Gladstone  came  back  to  power,  after  having 
triumphantly  overthrown  the  brilliant  imperial  policy  of 
Lord  Beaconsfield.  Foreign  policy  then  became  uppermost, 
as  domestic  policy  had  been  in  his  former  administration, 
and  he  succeeded  to  a  heritage  not  at  all  to  his  mind. 


406  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

His  idea  of  foreign  policy  had  been,  from  the  first,  gen- 
erous forbearance  in  dealing  with  weak  Powers;  and, 
holding  this  view,  he  had  in  the  early  part  of  his  parlia- 
mentary career  vehemently  attacked  Lord  Palmerston.  To 
Italian  liberty  he  had  given  a  first  popular  impulse  by  his 
attacks  on  the  Neapolitan  Government  and  its  cruelties. 
When  Russia  was  humbled  by  the  Crimean  war  he  pleaded 
that  she  ought  to  be  granted  generous  terms  of  peace ; 
he  assisted  to  strengthen  Greece  by  the  acquisition  of 
Thessaly  and  the  gift  of  the  Ionian  Isles ;  he  soothed  Italy 
when  indignant  at  the  cession  to  France  of  Nice  and 
Savoy ;  he  preserved  Bulgaria  and  Montenegro  as  autono- 
mous States,  when  Lord  Beaconsfield  might  have  sacrificed 
them  both ;  above  all,  he  refused  to  pursue  the  policy  of 
allowing  England  to  attempt  annexation  in  India  beyond 
her  frontier  of  the  Indus,  —  and  then  suddenly  he  suc- 
ceeded to  his  rival's  place,  and  had  to  make  the  best  he 
could  of  a  foreign  policy  based  on  ideas  very  different  from 
his  own. 

He  soon  found  himself  waging  a  bloody  war  with  the 
Arabs,  not  one  foot  of  whose  deserts  he  cared  to  obtain. 
Instead  of  promoting  the  arts  of  peace  and  industry,  very 
dear  to  him  as  a  man  of  the  middle  classes,  the  surplus 
revenue  of  which  he  had  been  so  proud  in  the  days  of  his 
former  administration  had  to  be  spent  in  useless  wars. 
Had  Lord  Palmerston  been  alive  to  rule  things  with  a  high 
hand,  Arabi  Pasha  might  never  have  made  his  rebellion, 
nor  Russia  have  encroached  quietly  until  almost  within 
reach  of  the  gates  of  Herat.  Mr.  Gladstone  might  indeed 
have  erred  in  applying  the  principles  of  international  policy, 
suitable  to  civilized  nations,  to  countries  that  had  never 
learned  the  first  lessons  of  self  restraint ;  but  he  had  to  take 
up  England's  foreign  policy  as  he  found  it.  He  induced 
General  Gordon  to  go  to  the  Soudan ;  then  he  resolved  to 
abandon  it,  after  relieving  the  garrison  of  nineteen  thousand 
men  in  three  fortified  cities.  But  no  representations  could 
make  him  give  ear  to  the  cries  for  haste  which  reached  him 
from  Egypt.  He  hated  to  spend  English  money  on  mili- 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  407 

tary  measures  in  that  country ;  he  would  not  believe  that 
Gordon  was  in  peril. 

As  dangers  thickened  round  Gordon  in  Khartoum,  and 
his  latest  despatches  were  being  discussed  at  the  Reform 
Club  in  May,  1884,  a  friend  said  to  Mr.  W.  E.  Forster, 
then  Irish  Secretary,  that  he  could  not  understand  how 
Mr.  Gladstone  could  reconcile  the  repeated  assurances  of 
Gordon's  safety,  which  he  was  giving  to  the  House  of 
Commons,  with  the  General's  own  words,  which  he  must 
have  had  in  his  possession  at  the  time  that  he  offered  the 
assurances.  "  Ah  !  "  said  Forster,  "  you  must  not  mistake 
Gladstone.  He  is  perfectly  honest  and  sincere, — per- 
fectly. But  he  has  that  wonderful  power  of  convincing 
himself  that  certain  things  are  different  from  what  they 
seem  to  everybody  else.  He  believes  Gordon  to  be  quite 
safe,  and  he  really  believes  it ;  but  he  is  the  only  man 
in  England  who  could  persuade  himself  of  it,  in  the  face 
of  facts." 

In  1885  Mr.  Gladstone  introduced  a  bill  for  giving  Home 
Rule  to  Ireland ;  but  the  House  of  Commons,  exasperated 
by  the  dynamite  outrages  that  had  alarmed  all  London, 
would  not  support  him.  He  dissolved  Parliament,  and 
appealed  to  the  country.  The  new  Parliament  was  re- 
turned with  an  immense  majority  against  him,  and  Lord 
Salisbury  and  a  Tory  Government  reigned  in  his  stead. 

The  Irish  policy  of  Lord  Salisbury  and  his  party  was  dia- 
metrically opposed  to  Mr.  Gladstone's.  Their  idea  has 
been  to  endeavor  to  pacify  the  refractory  nation,  not  by 
concession  of  political  privileges,  but  by  promoting  in  all 
ways  its  material  prosperity. 

Meantime  in  his  retirement,  Mr.  Gladstone,  although 
eighty,  retained  his  energy,  his  enthusiasm,  his  sympathy  in 
every  topic  of  the  day.  It  would  seem  as  if  he  said,  with 
Arnauld  of  the  Port  Royalists,  "  Have  we  not  all  eternity 
to  rest  in?"  or  that  he  was  spurred  on  by  the  thought  that 
"  the  night  cometh,  when  no  man  can  work." 

One  of  his  last  political  acts  of  "right-about-face"  was, 
during  his  retirement,  to  write,  while  travelling  in  Italy,  a 


408    ENGLAND  IN  THE   NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

letter  to  some  Italian  statesman,  which  was  interpreted  to 
mean  that  he  took  the  Pope's  part  against  the  King  of  Italy, 
—  he,  who  in  1852  had  published  scathing  pamphlets  against 
what  were  called  the  Vatican  Decrees,  which  raised  an 
absurd  howl  in  England  over  the  appointment  by  the  Pope 
of  bishops  having  English  titles  in  England. 

These  pages  are  a  link  between  history  and  politics. 
They  close  with  the  Queen's  Jubilee  in  1887,  beyond  which 
they  do  not  follow  Mr.  Gladstone's  career.  Times  change, 
and  men  and  women  as  they  grow  older  and  gain  expe- 
rience may  well  suffer  their  opinions  to  grow  too.  But 
certainly  Mr.  Gladstone's  changes  of  opinion  in  the  course 
of  sixty-five  years  have  been  extraordinary. 
.  He  entered  Parliament  a  Conservative ;  he  is  now  a 
leader  of  advanced  Liberal  opinions. 

He  began  by  defending  the  English  Church  as  a  State 
Church  in  Ireland  ;  he  disestablished  it. 

He  began  by  opposing  an  increased  grant  to  Maynooth ; 
he  has  ended  by  establishing  Irish  Universities. 

He  is  a  sincerely  religious  man  and  a  High  Churchman ; 
but  he  is  said  to  contemplate  the  disruption  of  Church  and 
State  in  Wales  and  England. 

He  attacked  the  Pope  formerly  with  great  bitterness ;  he 
would  not  object,  apparently,  to  restore  his  temporal  power. 

I  might  carry  this  on  further,  but  I  prefer  to  quote  Mr. 
Gladstone's  own  words  from  an  early  article  on  the  Spanish 
priest,  Blanco  White,  as  applicable  to  himself  in  this  con- 
nection :  — 

"We  cannot  with  impunity  tamper  with  the  fearful  and  won- 
derful composition  of  our  spiritual  being.  Sincerity  of  intention 
after  this  can  only  exist  in  a  qualified  and  imperfect  sense.  It 
may  be  in  a  manner  sincere,  so  far  as  depends  on  the  contem- 
poraneous action  of  the  will,  but  it  is  clogged  and  hampered  by 
the  encumbering  remains  of  a  former  sincerity." 

His  home,  as  I  said,  is  at  Hawarden,  not  very  far  from 
Liverpool,  where  his  father's  commercial  house  was  so 
prosperous  three-quarters  of  a  century  ago. 


MR.    GLADSTONE.  409 

The  park  of  Hawarden  is  beautiful ;  the  house  is  all  for 
comfort,  not  for  show.  Books  are  everywhere,  and  por- 
traits, most  of  them  by  some  great  master.  Mr.  Glad- 
stone's own  portrait  is  by  Millais ;  Sir  Kenelm  Digby  is  by 
Vandyke.  The  master  of  all  works  in  a  study  leading  from 
his  library,  having  around  him  all  the  litter  literary  workers 
love.  Only,  he  has  tables  set  apart  for  different  occupations. 
There  is  an  Irish  table  and  a  Homer  table,  —  "where,"  said 
Mr.  Gladstone  lately  to  a  visitor,  with  a  sigh,  "  I  rarely 
work  now."  There,  too,  is  Mrs.  Gladstone's  own  table,  de- 
voted largely  to  the  affairs  of  the  orphanage  she  has  built 
at  her  park  gates.  Homer,  Dante,  and  Shakespeare  have 
their  separate  compartments  in  the  library,  and  the  busts 
that  preside  there  are  of  Cobden,  Sidney  Herbert,  the 
Duke  of  Newcastle,  Canning,  and  Homer. 

For  many  years  Mr.  Gladstone  permitted  every  villager 
to  borrow  books,  from  his  own  shelves ;  but  he  has  recently 
(1894)  presented  to  the  village  of  Hawarden  an  excellent 
permanent  library.  So  long  as  he  lent  his  villagers  his 
own  books,  he  required  that  the  name  of  each  book  and 
its  borrower  should  be  entered  in  a  volume  kept  for  the 
purpose. 

"  The  Grand  Old  Man  "  is  the  name  by  which  he  is 
affectionally  known  to  his  own  party.  He  was  long  the 
idol  of  the  working-class  in  England,  who  would  have 
blindly  followed  him  in  anything  but  his  patronage  of 
Irishmen.  All  his  life  he  has  been  a  man  with  tremen- 
dous powers  of  work,  and  his  physical  energy  keeps  pace 
with  the  intellectual.  A  reviewer  says  :  — 

"  To  fell  a  stout  and  ancient  tree  of  mighty  girth  ;  to  walk 
with  ease  and  pleasure  a  dozen  miles  ;  to  translate  from  English 
into  elegant  Latin,  or  from  Latin  and  Greek  into  elegant  Eng- 
lish ;  to  address  a  concourse  of  some  thousands  of  hearers,  or 
to  deliver  an  oration  from  the  chair  of  a  university  ;  to  deal  suc- 
cessfully with  the  complicated  embarrassments  of  a  tariff,  or  the 
perplexities  of  a  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer;  to  write  essays 
as  an  accomplished  journalist ;  or  firmly  to  grasp  the  rudder  of 
the  vessel  of  State,  —  all  these  exhibit  a  variety  of  power  surely 


410  ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

not  less  than  astonishing  to  ordinary  mortals.  To  all  which  it 
must  be  added  that  he  is  not  a  remote  and  silent  landlord;  he 
is  at  home  and  talkative  with  the  tenants  and  the  villagers 
takes  an  interest  in  the  Literary  or  Young  Men's  Society  of  his 
little  village,  and  is  a  frequent  caller  at  many  of  the  cottages." 

It  has  been  said  that  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Gladstone  attribute 
much  of  Mr.  Gladstone's  health  to  the  fact  that  he  will 
have  his  Sunday  to  himself  and  to  his  family,  undisturbed 
by  any  of  the  agitations  of  business,  the  cares  of  State,  or 
even  the  recreations  of  literature  or  of  scholastic  study. 


CHAPTER  XVI. 
QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE  AND  HER  FAMILY. 


F^ROM  1880  to  1887  it  was  the  foreign  policy  of  Eng- 
land that  secured  general  interest;  domestic  affairs 
took  a  second  place,  except  when  the  nation  grew  angry 
at  the  ill-success  of  far-off  military  expeditions,  or  at  the 
supineness  of  those  in  power,  who  ought  to  have  listened  to 
the  general  voice,  and  forestalled  irreparable  misfortunes. 
Then  the  offending  ministry  was  turned  out,  and  another 
placed  in  office  to  make  the  best  it  could  of  the  confused 
foreign  policy  left  by  its  predecessor.  But  these  events  in 
English  history  are  all  connected  with  Africa.  The  rebel- 
lion of  Arabi  Pasha  ;  the  bombardment  of  Alexandria  ;  the 
occupation  of  Egypt  ;  the  campaigns  in  Nubia  and  the 
Soudan  ;  the  fall  of  Khartoum,  and  the  death  of  General 
Gordon  ;  the  Ashantee  war  ;  the  Abyssinian  war  ;  and  the 
war  with  Cetewayo,  and  that  with  the  Boers,  —  all  occurred 
during  this  period,  and  may  be  treated  of  elsewhere. 

Our  English  word  "jubilee  "  comes  from  a  Hebrew  word 
which  signifies  a  ram,  because  its  commencement,  once  in 
fifty  years,  was  proclaimed  to  the  people  by  the  sound  of 
trumpets  made  of  ram's  horns.  Queen  Victoria  is  the  only 
English  sovereign  since  the  Conquest  who  can  be  said  to 
have  reigned  fifty  years  on  her  Jubilee  day.  Henry  III. 
was  crowned  on  the  death  of  his  father  in  1216,  in  the 
Abbey  at  Gloucester,  —  the  only  English  sovereign  crowned 
elsewhere  than  at  Westminster  since  Edward  the  Confessor's 
day.  The  Abbey  at  Westminster  was  in  possession  of  the 
Dauphin  of  France  on  Henry's  accession,  and  the  Earl  of 
Pembroke  governed  as  Regent  during  his  minority,  which 
lasted  till  1222.  He  was  re-crowned  at  Westminster  in 
great  state  by  the  Archbishop,  Stephen  Langton;  and  when 


412    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

he  died,  in  1272,  his  actual  reign  had  lasted  fifty  years. 
Edward  III.  ascended  the  throne  on  the  deposition  of  his 
father  in  1327,  but  it  was  not  until  1330  that  he  assumed 
the  reins  of  government.  He  died  in  1377,  having  reigned 
actually  forty- seven  years,  though  nominally  fifty.  Poor 
George  III.  came  to  the  throne  a  young  man  in  1760, 
but  in  1810,  a  few  weeks  after  his  Jubilee,  he  became 
hopelessly  insane,  and  from  November,  1789,  to  February, 
1790,  England  had  been  governed  by  Mr.  Pitt,  pending 
a  Regency  Bill,  which  was  thrown  aside  as  the  King 
recovered. 

Though  the  reason  of  George  III.  was  tottering  when  his 
Jubilee  year  came  round,  it  was  the  wish  of  the  nation  and 
his  family  that  the  day  should  be  one  of  great  public  rejoic- 
ing. It  is  true  that  the  affairs  of  the  country  were  then  most 
gloomy.  Trade  was  depressed,  men's  patience  and  their 
purses  were  exhausted  by  the  long  struggle  with  Napoleon ; 
the  expedition  to  Walcheren,  too,  had  just  failed,  to  the 
great  disappointment  of  the  British  public.  Nevertheless, 
all  England  determined  to  keep  holiday,  and  to  celebrate 
the  occasion,  in  true  British  fashion,  with  roast  beef,  plum- 
pudding,  and  beer.  These  national  adjuncts  to  thanksgiving 
were  even  ordered  by  the  Governor  of  St.  Bartholomew's 
Hospital  for  all  his  patients.  In  every  town  or  village  an  ox 
was  roasted  whole.  His  Majesty's  navy  had  rum  enough 
served  out  to  float  a  man-of-war.  At  Dunstable,  one  thou- 
sand magnates  feasted  at  one  table.  All  poor  debtors  who 
owed  money  to  the  Crown  were  released,  and  large  subscrip- 
tions were  raised  to  free  others,  the  King  giving  no  less  than 
^4,000.  Prisoners  of  war  (provided  they  were  not  French) 
were  sent  home  ;  all  deserters  from  fleet  and  army  were 
granted  a  free  pardon ;  those  confined  for  military  offences 
were  set  at  liberty ;  and  officers  of  both  army  and  navy  were 
promoted.  In  London,  joy-bells  woke  the  citizens  at  dawn. 
Everybody  was  early  afoot,  each  dressed  in  his  best  for  the 
occasion  ;  flags  and  ribbons  decorated  the  houses.  Nearly 
every  one  wore  a  blue  ribbon,  with  a  medal  suspended  from 
it,  which  had  been  struck  for  the  occasion.  The  Lord  Mayor 


QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  413 

and  Corporation,  in  a  blaze  of  civic  splendor,  went  to  divine 
service  at  St.  Paul's.  All  the  churches  were  open  for  a  ser- 
vice of  thanksgiving ;  after  service  came  a  grand  review  in 
Hyde  Park ;  then  the  roast  beef,  the  plum-pudding,  and  the 
beer;  and,  last,  a  general  illumination.  In  Ireland  the 
rejoicings  were  kept  up  for  three  days,  with  such  good 
humor  that  it  is  recorded  that  all  the  time  the  revels  lasted 
there  was  not  one  magistrate's  charge  in  Dublin. 

But  the  sad  part  of  the  affair,  though  it  does  not  seem  to 
have  damped  the  general  enjoyment  at  the  time,  was,  that 
not  a  member  of  the  royal  family  spent  the  day  in  London. 
The  state  of  the  poor  King's  health  was  so  uncertain  that 
his  Queen  and  his  physicians  dared  not  expose  him  to  the 
excitement  of  the  occasion.  At  Windsor  the  people  had 
the  roast  ox,  the  grog,  the  porter,  and  the  pudding ;  and  the 
Queen,  with  her  three  sons,  came  to  see  the  roast,  and  honor 
it  by  tasting  of  the  delicacy.  They  had  a  thanksgiving 
service  in  St.  George's  Chapel,  at  which  the  King  was 
present ;  and  in  the  evening  the  Queen  gave  a  grand  recep- 
tion at  Frogmore,  not  only  to  members  of  the  court  circle, 
but  to  honest  tradesmen  of  Windsor  and  their  wives.  Brave, 
sad,  and  oft-maligned  poor  Queen  !  How  her  heart  must 
have  ached  for  the  husband  she  sincerely  loved,  left  behind 
in  his  own  rooms  at  Windsor,  while  she  did  the  honors,  with 
what  gayety  she  might,  of  this  unusual  style  of  royal  festivity. 
These  things  took  place  on  October  25,  1810.  All  but 
seventy-seven  years  after,  on  June  21,  1887,  occurred  an- 
other Jubilee,  —  that  of  the  granddaughter  of  the  "  good 
old  King,"  as  his  subjects  loved  to  call  him.  He  might  not 
have  been  "good  "  as  a  king,  but  he  was  exemplary  as  a  man, 
and  most  unhappy.  The  reign  of  Queen  Victoria  has  been 
in  all  respects  "happy  and  glorious,"  save  for  the  sad  be- 
reavement which  on  December  14,  1861,  darkened  her  life  ; 
but  even  as  to  bereavements,  Death  has  snatched  fewer  vic- 
tims from  her  large  family  circle  than  he  usually  does  from 
persons  of  her  age. 

After  the  Prince  Consort's  death  the  Queen  secluded  her- 
self for  many  years  from  court  ceremonials,  thereby  greatly 


414    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

disappointing  her  subjects ;  she  has  worn  black  all  the  days 
of  her  widowhood,  unless  on  exceptional  public  occasions. 
During  these  years  her  companionship  and  intimacy  has 
been  with  her  own  family,  or,  for  a  brief  period,  with  Lord 
Beaconsfield.  Her  health,  considered  frail  in  her  girlhood, 
has,  on  the  whole,  been  excellent.  When,  on  the  day  of  her 
Jubilee,  she  drove  in  state  to  Westminster  Abbey,  she  was 
attended  by  a  gallant  cortege  of  sons  and  sons-in-law.  The 
papers  at  that  time  published  sheets  containing  portraits  of 
all  her  descendants, — her  children,  her  grandchildren,  and 
two  great-grandchildren,  her  sons-in-law  and  daughters-in- 
law.  Among  all  these  there  is  not  one  who  has  openly  dis- 
honored his  or  her  high  lineage.  There  have  been  among 
them  many  sorrows,  but  some  have  been  distinguished  among 
the  good  and  great  of  their  generation  for  noble  womanly 
and  manly  qualities.  All  the  women,  whether  connected 
with  the  Queen  by  birth  or  marriage,  have  been  ladies  of 
exceptional  ability  and  virtue. 

The  day  of  the  Jubilee,  Tuesday,  June  21,  1887,  was  very 
warm.  The  sun  shone  with  a  fierce  brightness  he  seldom 
does  in  England.  The  chief  desire  of  those  who  planned 
the  ceremonies  was  to  make  them,  like  those  of  the  Corona- 
tion, a  source  of  interest  and  rejoicing  to  the  people,  —  who 
were  to  witness  the  splendors  of  a  procession  formed  largely 
of 'princes  and  high  dignitaries,  while  a  solemn  religious 
service  took  place  in  the  Abbey. 

Seats  and  windows  sold  at  prices  higher  than  those  upon 
the  Coronation  Day,  all  along  the  line  of  the  procession 
from  Buckingham  Palace  to  Westminster  Abbey.  The 
crowd  was  dense,  but  pleased,  and  in  good  humor. 

Under  a  red  and  fawn-color  striped  awning  all,  except 
royal  personages,  who  had  tickets  for  the  religious  services 
had  to  pass  to  enter  the  Abbey.  Along  this  covered  way 
streamed  by  eight  o'clock  A.  M.  ladies  in  superb  toilets, 
gentlemen  in  cocked  hats  and  black  velvet  court  costumes, 
generals  and  general  officers  in  brilliant  scarlet,  naval  men 
in  uniforms  of  blue  and  white  and  gold. 

Among  the  earliest  of  the  royal  family  to  arrive  were  three 


QUEEN   VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  415 

young  girls,  daughters  of  the  Duke  of  Edinburgh,  their  pretty 
fair  hair  floating  down  their  backs,  with  flapping  hats  of 
Tuscan  straw  shading  them  from  the  sun.  Princess  Frederica 
of  Hanover,  wife  of  the  Freiherr  von  Pawel-Rammingen,  who 
had  been  for  many  years  her  blind  father's  secretary,  was 
there,  dressed  all  in  white,  looking  pale,  but  very  princely. 
The  Duchess  of  Teck  (Princess  Mary  of  Cambridge),  always 
a  favorite  with  the  people,  and  her  daughter,  Princess  May, 
were  loudly  cheered.  Then  came  the  crowned  heads  who 
were  not  to  follow  the  Queen  in  the  procession,  the  royal- 
ties of  Greece  and  Denmark,  and  the  King  and  Queen 
of  the  Belgians.  There  were  Indian  Princes  all  wrapped 
round  with  shawls  and  stuffs  of  rich  dark  colors,  stolid  and 
stately,  indifferent  alike  to  plaudits  and  to  the  rays  of  a 
burning  sun  which  made  their  jewels  flash  and  sparkle. 
Queen  Emma  of  Hawaii  was  among  the  crowned  heads,  and 
Princess  Lililokalani,  —  since  dethroned,  who  will  never 
have  a  Jubilee.  There  was  an  Indian  Mahranee,  distin- 
guished by  her  Eastern  grace  and  quiet  dignity;  and  a 
Prince  of  Japan,  looking  pleased  and  amused,  in  a  queer 
white  helmet-like  cap,  adorned  with  feathers  and  magenta 
ribbons. 

It  was  half  an  hour  after  midday  when  the  Queen's  pro- 
cession reached  the  Abbey.  In  the  state  carriage  with  the 
Queen  sat  the  Princess  of  Wales  and  the  Crown- Princess' of 
Prussia. 

In  carriages  that  followed  were  other  Princesses :  the 
three  daughters  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  their  carriage  look- 
ing like  a  bower  of  tulle  and  whiteness  ;  Princess  Irene,  the 
daughter  of  Princess  Alice,  was  there,  and  their  aunts,  —  the 
Princess  Christian,  Princess  Louise,  Princess  Beatrice,  and 
the  Duchess  of  Edinburgh. 

The  Queen,  in  place  of  the  black  bonnet  which  for 
twenty-six  years  had  saddened  the  eyes  of  her  people,  wore 
a  coronet-shaped  bonnet  of  white  lace,  bedecked  with  dia- 
monds, which  made  her  look  ten  years  younger.  It  was 
remarked  that  she  seemed  pleased,  and  was  smiling.  Pleased 
and  interested,  too,  seemed  the  Crown-Princess  of  Prussia, 


41 6   ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

—  little  forecasting  that  within  a  year  she  would  be  both  an 
Empress  and  a  widow,  though  her  husband  had  taken  ad- 
vantage of  his  journey  to  England  to  consult  Dr.  Mackenzie 
as  to  his  throat,  which  was  already  becoming  a  cause  of 
anxiety.  The  Crown- Princess  wore  a  superb  gray  silk,  and 
a  white  bonnet,  with  strings  of  olive  green.  The  Duchess 
of  Albany  was  there,  still  in  slight  mourning.  She  was 
always  a  favorite,  and  was  loudly  cheered. 

The  most  interesting  part  of  the  procession  was  the  escort 
that  immediately  followed  the  Queen's  carriage,  —  her  three 
sons  riding  abreast,  and  her  five  sons-in-law ;  conspicuous 
among  these  last  was  the  splendid  figure  of  the  Crown- 
Prince  of  Prussia.  The  only  contretemps  during  the  day 
was  that  the  horse  of  the  Marquis  of  Lome  threw  him,  just 
as  the  procession  was  about  to  start. 

The  services  in  the  Abbey  were  solemn  and  beautiful. 
There  is  a  service  in  the  English  Prayer-book  for  the  anni- 
versary of  the  succession  of  a  sovereign.  The  archbishops 
officiated,  and  many  bishops  and  high  ecclesiastical  digni- 
taries assisted  in  the  chancel.  Judges  in  their  wigs  and 
robes  were  there ;  groups  of  Indians,  in  gorgeous  costumes 
and  jewels,  came  to  do  honor  to  the  Empress  of  India ; 
sheriffs  from  the  fifty-two  counties  of  England  and  Wales, 
and  mayors  from  the  principal  cities. 

The  next  day,  Wednesday,  June  22,  a  great  feast  was 
given  to  all  the  charity-school  children  of  London  in 
Hyde  Park,  which  the  Queen  and  all  the  royal  person- 
ages attended ;  and  in  the  evening  of  that  day  all 
London  was  illuminated.  "  I  think,"  says  a  writer  in 
the  "  Monthly  Packet,"  "  that  for  once  the  English  were 
not  taking  their  pleasure  sadly,  but  were  delighted,  inter- 
ested, and  amused  with  wondrous  little.  Dense  as  were 
the  crowds,  good  humor  and  a  certain  order  prevailed 
everywhere." 

The  Queen  has  had  nine  children,  of  whom,  in  1894, 
seven  are  still  living,  —  Victoria  Adelaide  Mary  Louisa, 
Princess  Royal,  now  the  widowed  Empress  Frederick, 
born  in  1 840 ;  Albert  Edward,  Prince  of  Wales,  born  in 


PRINCESS  ROYAL. 

{Afterwards  Empress  of  Germany.} 


QUEEN   VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  417 

1841 ;  Alice  Maud  Mary,  Grand-Duchess  of  Hesse-Darm- 
stadt, born  in  1843  ;  Alfred  Ernest  Albert,  Duke  of  Edin- 
burgh and  Duke  of  Saxe-Coburg-Gotha,  born  in  1844; 
Helena  Augusta,  Princess  Christian,  born  in  1846;  Louise 
Caroline  Alberta,  Marchioness  of  Lome,  born  in  1848; 
Arthur  William  Patrick  Albert,  Duke  of  Connaught,  born 
in  1850;  Leopold  George  Duncan  Albert,  Duke  of  Albany, 
born  in  1853;  Beatrice  Mary  Victoria  Feodora,  married 
Prince  Henry  of  Battenberg,  born  in  1857. 

Very  briefly  I  propose  to  tell  the  history  of  these  Princes 
and  Princesses.  We  begin  with  Victoria,  the  Princess-Royal, 
born  shortly  after  her  parents  were  twenty-one,  and  prob- 
ably the  most  highly  intellectual  member  of  her  family. 

She  was  born  November  21,  1840.  "A  plump,  healthy, 
beautiful  princess,"  says  the  Court  Chronicle,  who 
began  her  life  by  protesting  vehemently  against  being 
inspected  by  the  Lords  of  the  Council  and  other  dignita- 
ries, who,  according  to  court  etiquette,  were  stationed  for 
that  purpose  in  the  next  chamber. 

She  was  a  very  pretty  young  girl  at  the  time  of  her 
marriage,  and  was  always  her  father's  especial  delight. 
Baron  Stockmar  was  also  very  fond  and  proud  of  her. 
Before  she  was  four  years  old  she  spoke  French  as  well 
as  she  could  speak  English,  and  her  mother  records  in  her 
Journal  several  remarkable  instances  of  her  early  under- 
standing and  self-control. 

On  Mrs.  Bancroft's  first  visit  to  Windsor,  as  wife  of  the 
American  Ambassador,  when  she  went  to  take  leave  of  the 
Queen,  who  was  in  the  picture-gallery,  Her  Majesty  said, 
"  Oh,  but  you  have  not  seen  the  children  !  I  will  go  and 
bring  them."  She  soon  returned,  carrying  the  baby,  Alice, 
and  followed  by  the  Princess- Royal  and  the  Prince  of 
Wales,  the  latter  shrinking  behind  his  sister.  "  It  is 
always  so,"  said  the  Queen.  "They  are  devoted  to  each 
other.  She  is  afraid  of  nothing.  He  is  shy,  and  always 
wants  her  to  speak  for  him." 

The  Princess-Royal  was  her  father's  constant  companion, 
and  that  of  her  mother  as  much  as  possible.  When  she 

27 


418    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

was  three  or  four  years  old,  the  Queen  laments  in  her 
Journal  that  her  unavoidable  occupations  and  engage- 
ments prevented  her  from  nightly  hearing  her  children 
say  their  prayers. 

The  Princess  was  an  excellent  artist,  making  illustrations 
for  the  books  she  loved,  especially  for  the  "  Idyls  of  the 
King,"  which  greatly  pleased  her  father. 

As  the  children  grew  older,  the  Queen  purchased  Osborne 
House,  in  the  Isle  of  Wight,  as  a  seaside  residence,  and 
rejoiced  over  her  new  acquisition,  "  as  it  will  give  us,"  she 
says  to  her  uncle,  "a  home  of  our  own. 

The  children  had  their  little  gardens  at  Osborne,  and 
a  charming  Swiss  cottage,  where  they  played  at  house- 
keeping ;  cooked,  dusted,  swept,  and,  once  in  a  while, 
guests  staying  with  their  parents  were  invited  to  luncheon, 
which  the  children  cooked  and  served  with  their  own 
hands. 

Princess  Alice,  in  after  years,  writes  to  her  mother : 
"  We  always  say  to  each  other  that  no  children  were  ever 
made  so  happy  with  the  comforts  and  enjoyments  that 
children  would  wish  for,  as  we  were." 

Then,  too,  by  the  time  the  Princess-Royal  was  ten  years 
old  they  acquired  the  beloved  Highland  residence  of 
Balmoral.  The  Queen's  account  of  their  family  life  in 
the  Highlands  is  full  of  anecdotes  of  "Vicky,"  the  ex- 
tremely uncouth  name  by  which  the  Princess-Royal  was 
known  in  her  family  circle. 

When  the  Queen  visited  Ireland,  in  1849,  she  took  with 
her  her  four  children.  The  party  landed  in  the  Cove  of 
Cork,  at  a  spot  thence  called  Queenstown.  The  Princess- 
Royal  and  Princess  Alice  afterwards  went  with  their  parents 
to  Edinburgh.  The  Queen  records  that  on  reaching  Holy- 
rood  she  went  out  with  her  two  girls,  without  rest,  to  explore 
the  ruined  Abbey.  The  Scottish  scenes  awakened  the 
enthusiasm  of  the  elder  Princess,  the  daily  companion  of 
her  father,  who  had  been,  as  it  were,  brought  up  by  his 
grandmothers  on  Walter  Scott's  writings,  one  of  them 
having  been  in  the  habit  of  telling  the  stories  of  the 


QUEEN   VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  419 

Waverley  Novels  before  bed-time  to  the  two  eager  little 
grandsons  at  her  knee. 

Prince  Albert  took  great  pains  to  instruct  his  clever  little 
daughter  in  the  course  of  public  events,  and  to  give  her 
ideas  of  politics  and  political  economy.  On  one  occasion 
he  made  her  translate  a  profound  German  pamphlet,  on  the 
future  policy  of  Germany,  which  he  wanted  to  show  to  the 
Prime  Minister. 

During  the  Crimean  war  the  Queen  and  her  daughters 
took  an  intense  interest  in  the  work  of  Miss  Nightingale ; 
and  when,  after  the  war,  that  lady  came  on  a  visit  to  Bal- 
moral, the  young  Princesses  hung  upon  her  words,  learning 
lessons  they  were  so  nobly  to  put  in  practice  in  the  wars  of 
1866  and  1870. 

It  was  immediately  after  the  Crimean  war  that  Prince 
Frederick  William,  son  of  the  Crown-Prince  of  Prussia,  then 
heir-presumptive  to  the  Prussian  throne,  came  to  Balmoral, 
and  there,  with  a  sprig  of  white  heather,  the  emblem  of 
good  fortune,  wooed  the  Princess-Royal  in  true  lover 
fashion  on  a  Scottish  hillside  ;  but  she  was  so  young  that 
her  parents  endeavored  to  insist  that  two  years  must  pass 
before  the  marriage.  It  took  place,  however,  January  25, 
1858,  in  London.  I  cannot  but  think  that  a  few  extracts 
from  the  Queen's  own  Diary  will  have  more  interest  than 
any  mere  abridgment  into  another's  words. 

"  The  wedding-presents,"  she  writes,  "  were  all  set  out  in  the 
great  drawing-room  [of  Buckingham  Palace]  the  evening  before, 
—  Mamma's  and  ours  on  one  table,  Fritz's  and  his  family's,  and 
Uncle  Leopold's  and  others,  on  another.  Fritz's  pearls  were  the 
largest  I  have  ever  seen,  — one  row.  We  brought  in  Fritz  and 
Vicky.  She  was  in  ecstasies,  —  quite  startled  ;  Fritz  delighted." 

Again :  — 

"  Dear  Vicky  gave  me  a  brooch,  a  very  pretty  one,  before 
church,  with  her  hair ;  and,  clasping  me  in  her  arms,  said,  '  I 
hope  to  be  worthy  to  be  your  child.'  " 

On  the  wedding-day  the  Queen  writes  also  :  — 


42O    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

"  While  I  was  dressing,  Vicky  came  to  me,  looking  well  and 
composed,  and  in  a  fine,  quiet  frame  of  mind.  Then  came  the 
time  to  go  ;  the  sun  was  shining  brightly.  Thousands  had  been 
out  since  early  dawn,  shouting,  bells  ringing,  etc.  The  two  eldest 
boys  went  first,  then  the  three  girls  in  pink  satin,  trimmed  with 
Newport  lace  ;  Alice  with  a  wreath,  and  the  two  others  with 
bouquets  only.  .  .  .  Our  darling  flower  looked  very  touching 
and  lovely,  with  such  an  innocent,  confiding,  serious  expression, 
her  veil  hanging  over  her  shoulders,  walking  between  her  be- 
loved father  and  dearest  Uncle  Leopold." 

While  Princess  Alice  wore  roses  and  white  heather,  the 
Princesses  Louise  and  Helena  wore  cornflowers,  in  memory 
of  the  bridegroom's  grandmother,  Queen  Louise  of  Prussia. 
It  was  her  favorite  flower,  and  ever  since  has  been  cherished 
by  her  descendants. 

The  Queen  continues  :  — 

"  It  was  beautiful  to  see  our  darling  kneeling  with  Fritz,  their 
hands  joined,  her  eight  bridesmaids  in  white  tulle,  with  roses 
and  white  heather,  looking  like  a  cloud  hovering  over  her." 

But  very  sorrowful  was  the  parting  on  the  snowy  Feb- 
ruary day  when  the  Princess  departed  to  her  new  people 
and  her  new  home. 

Then  Germany  was  proud  to  receive  an  English  bride  ; 
then  all  was  hope,  and  welcome,  and  enthusiasm ;  then 
Germany  was  not  puffed  up  with  national  pride.  Bis- 
marck, indeed,  had  objected  to  the  alliance,  and  some  of 
the  old  court  party  were  ready  to  cavil  at  the  free  and 
easy  ways  of  a  Princess  bred  in  a  court  where  all  was  home- 
like, affectionate,  and  natural ;  but  the  population  of  Berlin 
went  wild  with  welcome,  and  it  required  persistent  efforts  of 
foes  in  her  own  household,  backed  by  the  powerful  Chan- 
cellor, to  make  the  sweet  young  bride  "  unpopular."  Her 
father  had  said  of  her,  "  She  has  the  heart  of  a  child,  with 
a  man's  head  ;  "  and,  "  Unquestionably  she  will  turn  out  a 
very  superior  woman,  whom  Prussia  will  have  cause  to  bless. 
I  write  to  her  every  Wednesday  by  the  courier,  and  receive 
her  answer  by  the  same  messenger  on  the  Monday  follow- 
ing. We  discourse  in  this  manner  upon  general  topics, 


QUEEN   VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  421 

while  she  writes  to  her  mother  daily,  giving  her  the  details 
of  her  every-day  life." 

A  few  weeks  after  her  marriage  her  wise  father  warned 
her  not  to  be  disappointed  if  her  people,  having  been  rap- 
turous at  first,  should  become  critical.  I  remember  hearing 
it  said  at  the  time  that  when  the  German  court  ladies 
found  her  trousseau  included  a  dozen  pairs  of  stout  walk- 
ing-shoes, they  sneered  at  a  Princess  who  had  so  carefully 
provided  for  keeping  up  her  English  ways.  There  had 
never  been  a  Queen  of  Prussia  who  was  not  a  German ; 
and  the  Prussian  court  people  considered  English  man- 
ners foreign,  and  good  sense  an  invasion  of  time-honored 
etiquette. 

However,  these  things  were  but  the  little  cloud  at  first, 
"  like  a  man's  hand."  Prince  Albert,  writing  confidentially 
to  Stockmar,  tells  him  that  a  visit  which  he  paid  to  the 
young  people  not  long  after  their  marriage  had  afforded 
him  complete  satisfaction.  "  The  harmony  between  the 
young  couple,"  he  says,  "  is  perfect ;  "  and  in  a  hundred 
ways  we  find  this  judgment  confirmed. 

At  the  time  of  the  marriage,  the  father  of  Prince  Fritz 
(the  future  Emperor  William)  was  Regent  of  Prussia,  his 
brother,  King  Frederick  William,  having  become  imbecile. 

The  Princess  had  a  long  and  dangerous  period  of  suffer- 
ing before  the  birth  of  her  first  child.  A  lady,  resident  in 
Berlin  at  the  time,  states  that  she  saw  the  father  of  Prince 
Fritz  spring  into  a  cab  in  the  twilight,  and  drive  furiously  to 
his  son's  residence,  where  he  remained  until,  after  some 
hours  of  suspense,  Marshal  von  Wrangel  came  out  upon 
the  balcony,  and  announced  to  the  crowd  waiting  for  tid- 
ings :  "  All  is  well,  my  children  !  'T  is  as  sturdy  a  little 
recruit  as  heart  could  wish  to  see."  The  "  sturdy  little 
recruit "  was  a  delicate  child,  nevertheless,  born  with  his 
left  hand  and  arm  imperfect.  From  his  earliest  months, 
however,  he  was  taught  to  manage  this  defect,  and  he  has 
so  far  overcome  it  as  to  be  a  skilful  swordsman  and  rider. 
There  is  something  pathetic  in  the  entries  in  the  Queen's 
Journal  concerning  this  child,  when  we  remember  that  he 


422    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

lived  (at  least  at  one  period  of  his  life)  to  flout  his  grand- 
mother, and  to  weigh  down  his  mother's  heart  in  her  widow- 
hood with  sorrow  that  seems  greater  than  any  mother  or 
widow  in  common  life  is  called  to  bear. 

"Such  a  little  love!"  writes  his  grandmother.  "He  came 
walking  in  at  his  nurse's  hand,  in  a  little  white  dress,  with 
black  bows  ;  and  so  good.  .  .  .  He  is  a  fine,  fat  child,  with  a 
beautiful  white,  soft  skin,  very  fine  shoulders  and  limbs,  and  a 
very  dear  face.  ...  So  intelligent,  and  pretty,  and  good,  and 
affectionate,  —  such  a  darling  !  " 

As  the  year  1861  opened,  the  old  King  of  Prussia  died, 
and  the  future  Emperor  of  Germany  became  King  in  his 
stead.  Prince  Fritz  and  his  wife  then  became  Crown- 
Prince  and  Crown- Princess  of  Prussia.  At  this  time  all 
testimonies  agree  with  that  of  Lord  Clarendon,  who  writes 
to  Prince  Albert  that  he  is  not  astonished,  but  very  much 
pleased,  to  find  how  thoroughly  appreciated  and  very  much 
beloved  is  Her  Royal  Highness ;  and  adds  that  he  has 
been  more  than  ever  astonished  at  the  statesmanlike  and 
comprehensive  views  she  takes  of  Prussia's  affairs,  both 
internal  and  foreign,  and  of  the  duties  of  a  constitutional 
king. 

Unhappily,  these  duties  were  differently  understood  by 
the  Crown  Prince  and  Princess  on  the  one  part,  and  by 
the  King  and  Count  Bismarck  on  the  other,  whose  idea 
was  that  a  king  should  be  as  little  constitutional  as  was 
consistent  with  retaining  popularity. 

Before  Christmas  of  that  sad  year,  Prince  Albert  died. 
The  Crown- Princess  hastened  to  her  mother  in  her  great 
sorrow.  Her  visit  was  the  drop  of  comfort  in  the  bitter 
cup  the  Queen  was  drinking  in  those  days. 

Both  the  Crown- Prince  and  his  wife  were  fond  of  travel- 
ling. Besides  visiting  all  parts  of  their  own  country,  they 
were  frequently  in  Switzerland  and  Italy,  travelling  incog- 
nito, and  associating  on  pleasant  terms  with  such  interesting 
people  as  they  met. 

The  Crown  Prince  and  Princess  had  eight  children,  — 


CROWN  PRINCE    FREDERICK 

(Afterwards  Emperor  of  Germany.} 


QUEEN   VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  423 

William,  the  Emperor  William  II.  of  Germany ;  Charlotte, 
who  married  the  Prince  of  Saxe-Meim'ngen ;  Henry,  who 
married  his  cousin,  Princess  Irene  of  Hesse-  Darmstadt ; 
Sigismund,  who  died  before  he  was  two  years  old ;  Victoria, 
who  married  His  Serene  Highness  Prince  Adolphe  of 
Schaumburg-Lippe ;  Waldemar,  who  died  at  eleven  years 
of  age  ;  Sophia  Dorothea,  who  married  the  Prince  of  Sparta  ; 
Margaret,  who  married  Prince  Frederick  of  Hesse-Cassel. 

It  was  just  as  the  Seven  Weeks'  War  of  1866  was  break- 
ing out  that  the  Crown-Prince's  little  son  Sigismund  diett 
of  diphtheria.  At  the  battle  of  Sadowa,  or  Koniggratz,  the 
success  of  the  Prussians  was  largely  due  to  the  generalship 
of  the  Crown- Prince  ;  and  that  the  war  came  so  speedily  to 
a  close  was  owing  in  a  measure  to  his  statesmanship.  "  But 
ah  !  "  he  cries,  in  his  Diary,  "  victories  cannot  compensate 
me  for  the  loss  of  a  son  !  " 

In  the  Franco- Prussian  war  of  1870,  the  Crown- Prince 
commanded  the  Third  Army  Corps,  composed  largely  of 
South  German  troops,  whose  hearts  he  won.  Even  the 
French  felt  kindly  to  him,  —  the  one  German  in  the  Prus- 
sian army  who  inspired  that  feeling ;  yet  we  learn  now  that 
it  was  he  who  insisted  firmly  on  the  unity  of  Germany, 
and  the  necessity  that  Prussia  should  secure  the  imperial 
crown. 

As  I  said,  the  Emperor  William  I.  aimed  to  be  as  little 
a  constitutional  sovereign  as  possible,  and  transmitted  that 
notion  to  his  grandson ;  while  Prince  Frederick  hoped  to 
educate  the  people  up  to  aiding  the  sovereign  to  govern 
constitutionally.  All  through  his  father's  long  reign,  he  felt 
it  his  duty  to  repress  or  to  efface  himself,  and  to  keep  back 
the  public  expression  of  his  opinions,  though  never  to  deny 
or  abandon  them. 

During  the  war  with  France,  both  the  Crown- Princess 
and  her  sister  Alice,  animated  by  their  remembrance  of 
Miss  Nightingale's  labors,  devoted  themselves  to  hospital 
work,  while  the  Empress  Augusta  took  on  herself  the 
charge  of  providing  for  refugees  from  France  and  comforts 
for  the  soldiers. 


424    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

When  the  war  was  over,  the  particular  form  of  charity  to 
which  the  Crown-Prince  and  his  wife  devoted  themselves  was 
Kindergarten  work,  orphan  asylums,  and  industrial  schools. 

In  1 88 1  Prince  William,  now  Emperor,  married  Princess 
Augusta  Victoria  of  Schleswig-Holstein,  daughter  of  that 
Duke  of  Augustenburg  who  was  cavalierly  disinherited  by 
Count  Bismarck  in  1865.  They  have  now  (in  1894)  six 
sons  and  a  daughter.  Princess  Charlotte  of  Saxe-Meinin- 
gen  made  Queen  Victoria  a  great-grandmother  when  she 
was  fifty-nine. 

The  particulars  of  the  Crown-Prince's  illness  have  been 
very  fully  published,  and  are  generally  known.  We  have 
seen  that  in  June,  1887,  at  the  Queen's  Jubilee,  he  was  the 
handsomest  and  most  stalwart  of  her  sons  and  sons-in-law 
who  rode  in  the  procession  to  Westminster,  —  the  one  who 
excited  from  the  crowd  the  most  overwhelming  enthusiasm. 
After  the  Jubilee  he  and  his  wife  went,  in  July,  to  San 
Remo,  in  the  Riviera.  There  Dr.  Mackenzie  was  sum- 
moned early  in  November,  and  told  the  Prince  that  cancer 
in  his  throat  was  now  to  be  feared,  though  it  was  not  cer- 
tain. "  After  a  moment  of  silence,"  says  Dr.  Mackenzie, 
"he  grasped  my  hand,  and  said,  with  his  smile  of  peculiar 
sweetness,  '  I  have  been  lately  fearing  something  of  the 
sort ;  I  thank  you  for  being  so  frank  with  me.'  He  showed 
not  the  slightest  sign  of  depression,  but  spent  the  day  in 
his  usual  occupations,  and  at  dinner-time  that  evening  he 
was  cheerful,  without  apparent  effort,  and  chatted  freely  in 
his  usual  manner." 

A  day  or  two  afterwards,  in  reply  to  a  question  about  his 
general  health,  he  said  that  he  had  never  felt  better  in  his 
life,  adding,  "  I  feel  that  under  the  circumstances  I  ought 
to  apologize  for  feeling  so  well." 

Now  better,  now  worse,  the  illness  dragged  on  at  San 
Remo,  the  doctors  squabbling  and  disagreeing  all  the  time  ; 
the  old  Emperor  at  Berlin  worrying  about  the  future  ;  and 
the  young  William  and  Bismarck  arguing  privately  that  the 
Crown-Prince  never  would  be  fit  to  become  Emperor  of 
Germany,  and  that  the  Constitution  of  the  Empire  had  pro- 


QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  425 

vided  that  in  such  a  case  power  should  pass  into  the  hands 
of  the  next  heir. 

There  came  at  last  a  day  in  February  when  an  operation 
on  the  patient's  throat  had  to  be  performed.  The  wife 
implored  that  she  might  not  be  forced  to  leave  her  husband, 
who  might  possibly  die  under  the  knife ;  but  she  was  not 
allowed  to  be  in  the  room. 

The  Prince's  last  words  before  the  chloroform  adminis- 
tered took  effect  were  to  comfort  and  reassure  one  of  his 
attendants  who  was  greatly  overcome.  At  Berlin  the  old 
Emperor  was  cruelly  agitated  by  news  of  this  operation  and 
its  necessity.  Young  William  did  not  go  to  bed  all  night, 
but  walked  about  his  chamber. 

A  month  later,  March  9,  1888,  the  old  Emperor  died. 
The  new  Emperor  was  greatly  agitated  on  receiving  the 
intelligence ;  but  Prince  Bismarck  insisted  on  his  return  at 
once  to  his  own  dominions,  and  he  did  not  feel  it  politic  to 
make  any  opposition.  The  weather  was  cold  ;  the  journey 
began  in  a  drizzle. 

At  Leipzic,  Prince  Bismarck  met  him,  and  seemed  disposed 
to  be  courteous  and  sympathetic  to  the  new  sovereign,  and 
conciliatory  to  Dr.  Mackenzie.  Berlin  was  two  feet  deep 
in  snow  when  the  imperial  party  reached  Charlottenburg. 

From  that  day,  March  12,  to  the  day  of  his  death,  June 
15,  the  Emperor  Frederick  endeavored  to  work,  and  with 
all  his  might  to  fulfil  his  duty.  He  had  looked  forward  so 
long  to  being  Emperor.  He  had  formed  such  schemes  of 
what  he  would  do  for  his  people ;  of  his  establishing  the 
Empire  on  the  basis  of  the  love,  the  consent,  and  the  im- 
proved education  of  his  subjects ;  he  had  differed  so  much 
from  his  father,  and  had  so  steadily  effaced  himself  and 
repressed  his  own  views,  that  it  seemed  hard  that  he  was 
only  to  grasp  the  sceptre  with  a  dying  hand.  It  was  a  con- 
solation to  him  to  record  his  views,  which  he  never  would 
have  the  opportunity  to  carry  out,  and  which  it  had  been 
his  duty  during  his  father's  lifetime  to  make  no  effort  to 
have  understood.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that,  with  the 
consent  of  his  wife,  he  intrusted  his  Diary,  or  a  summary  of 


426    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY, 

it,  to  his  friend  Doctor  Geffecken,  who  was  subsequently  sent 
to  prison  by  Prince  Bismarck  and  the  young  Emperor  for 
publishing  extracts  from  it. 

Brief  as  the  reign  of  the  Emperor  Frederick  was,  there 
were  two  political  crises  .in  the  palace,  in  which  Bismarck 
triumphed  in  the  end.  The  first  concerned  the  marriage 
of  the  Princess  Victoria  (second  daughter  of  the  Emperor 
Frederick)  with  Prince  Alexander  of  Battenberg,  who  sub- 
sequently lost  his  bride,  as  he  had  already  lost  his  throne ; 
the  second  concerned  the  displacement  of  one  of  the 
ministers,  whom  a  few  weeks  after  the  accession  of  young 
William  Prince  Bismarck  ostentatiously  restored. 

The  scenes  in  the  Palace  at  Charlottenburg  were  distress- 
ing for  some  weeks,  and  must  have  greatly  agitated  the 
dying  Emperor.  In  May,  Queen  Victoria  came  to  Berlin, 
and  her  grandson  and  the  Chancellor  condescended  to  be 
outwardly  polite  to  her ;  but  fury  in  Berlin  was  so  stirred  up 
against  Dr.  Mackenzie  and  the  young  English  Empress,  who 
was  supposed  to  have  favored  him  instead  of  native-born 
Germans,  that  he  was  forced  to  accept  an  escort  of  soldiers 
to  protect  him  in  the  streets.  One  of  the  popular  alle- 
gations against  him  was  that  he  was  descended  from  a 
Polish  Jew.  His  father  was  really  a  long-descended  old 
Highlander,  who  had  hardly  ever  been  out  of  Scotland  in 
his  life. 

At  last  came  the  end.  A  member  of  the  French  Em- 
bassy writes  thus  from  Berlin,  June  15,  1888  :  — 

"The  Emperor  died  this  morning  at  a  quarter-past  eleven. 
For  some  hours  the  end  had  been  known  to  be  near.  The 
Emperor  had  not  been  able  to  speak.  All  he  could  do  was  to 
move  his  hand  and  his  eyelids.  Several  persons  who  saw  him 
yesterday  assured  me  that  no  one  could  imagine  how  piteous 
was  the  sight.  At  nine  on  the  evening  of  June  14  the  end  seemed 
to  be  near,  and  all  his  family  assembled  round  his  bed.  The 
night,  however,  was  quiet.  The  Emperor  did  not  move,  but  he 
lived,  for  from  time  to  time  great  tears  rolled  down  his  cheeks. 
About  four  o'clock  in  the  morning  he  took  the  hand  of  his  wife, 
made  a  sign  for  Prince  Bismarck  to  approach,  and  placed  his  hand 
on  hers.  A  few  moments  after  the  Empress  fainted.  At  ten  in 


PRINCE    OF  WALES. 


QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  427 

the  morning  a  garrison  chaplain  was  brought  in,  who  read  the 
prayers  for  the  dying.  All  those  present  knelt  beside  the  bed, 
except  an  artist  who  had  taken  a  sketch  of  the  old  Emperor's 
death-bed,  and  who  was  busily  drawing  in  one  corner  of  the 
chamber.  Then  it  began  to  be  perceived  that  the  dying  man 
was  becoming  unconscious.  Suddenly  he  raised  his  head,  as  if 
to  draw  one  more  free  breath,  and  then  it  fell  back  upon  the 
pillow.  The  Empress  was  carried,  hardly  conscious,  from 
the  chamber.  His  son,  the  new  Emperor,  closed  his  eyes." 

He  was  buried,  with  far  less  pomp  than  his  aged  father, 
in  the  parish  church  at  Potsdam. 

Had  he  lived,  would  Germany  have  esteemed  him  as  she 
ought?  "It  is  hard,"  says  the  French  writer  I  have  quoted, 
"  to  answer  this  question.  The  old  German  court  party 
may  rejoice  in  its  heart  at  his  death ;  but  the  lower  classes, 
the  bourgeoisie,  —  men  of  letters,  men  of  learning,  those 
who  are  the  marrow  of  the  nation,  —  will  despair,  for  they 
adored  him.  To  them  he  seemed  the  pilot  who  was  to 
steer  the  ship  of  state  to  the  Hesperides."  The  same 
writer  continues :  — 

"  I  need  not  tell  you  that  the  widowed  Empress  has  not  been 
popular  in  the  court,  where  it  has  been  the  fashion  to  disap- 
prove all  she  does.  She  called  in  Dr.  Mackenzie  as  a  throat 
specialist,  and  popular  rumor  said  it  was  for  no  reason  but  that 
he  was  a  friend  of  the  Battenbergs.  She  no  doubt  committed 
an  imprudence  when  she  caused  to  be  moved  the  furniture  in 
the  apartments  of  the  Queen  Louise,  which  had  never  been 
touched  since  her  death,  that  she  might  give  the  best  rooms  at 
Charlottenburg  to  her  mother  on  her  arrival;  and  at  this  sacri- 
lege, Berlin  did  nothing  but  howl.  The  love  her  husband  bore 
her  was  even  counted  against  her.  The  poor  woman  was  in  a 
forlorn  position ;  and  when  Queen  Victoria  came  to  Berlin,  it 
was  dreaded  lest  the  Berliners  should  visit  on  her  the  antipathy 
it  was  the  fashion  to  feel  for  her  daughter." 

The  next  child  of  Queen  Victoria  was  the  Prince  of  Wales. 
It  is  difficult  to  speak  of  him  ;  for  he  has  come  prominently 
before  the  public  in  only  two  characters,  —  the  maker  of 
public  speeches  on  public  occasions,  and  the  fast  young 


428    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

man,  known  in  the  gay  capitals  of  Europe  as  one  whose 
notice  and  attentions  have  been  injurious  to  the  reputations 
of  women.  Enough,  and  more  than  e'nough,  has  reached 
the  public  ear  upon  this  subject,  and  on  that  of  baccarat. 
There  are  other  things,  of  a  very  different  kind,  that  can  be 
said  about  the  Prince  of  Wales. 

He  has  occupied  for  fifty  years  a  very  difficult  position, 
and  in  some  respects  he  has  filled  it  with  very  remarkable 
prudence  and  ability.  Can  any  situation  be  more  trying 
than  that  of  an  English  heir-apparent?  Any  more  liable 
to  unjust  misrepresentations  and  to  cruel  disappointments? 
The  heir  of  the  monarchy  to-day  is  nothing;  to-morrow 
may  be  everything.  He  must  efface  himself.  He  must 
conceal  his  preferences  and  his  predilections,  for  fear  of 
exciting  false  hopes  or  creating  dangerous  jealousies.  He 
must  endeavor  to  shine,  without  absorbing  other  people's 
light ;  and  the  years  slip  by  him  without  giving  him  the 
opportunity  to  assert  his  value  or  his  manhood.  Under 
these  circumstances,  some  heirs-apparent  have  been  driven 
into  becoming  men  of  pleasure,  some  into  becoming  men  of 
intrigue,  many  into  becoming  both. 

No  Prince  of  Wales  since  Henry  VIII.  has  been  without 
blame,  if  he  had  come  of  age  during  his  father's  lifetime. 
The  quarrels  of  parents  with  their  eldest  sons,  all  through 
the  Hanoverian  dynasty,  are  matters  of  history.  If  public 
opinion  reproaches  Albert  Edward,  Prince  of  Wales,  with  a 
license  foreign  to  the  character  of  his  admirable  father,  it 
must  be  conceded  to  him  that  he  has  ever  been  a  dutiful 
subject,  a  hard  worker,  a  man  capable  of  rare  self-control, 
a  prince  who  has  borne  himself  with  dignity  in  a  very 
difficult  position. 

In  one  of  his  first  public  speeches,  he  told  his  hearers 
that,  being  forbidden  by  his  birth  to  take  any  part  in 
politics,  he  hoped  to  devote  himself  to  works  of  national 
utility  and  philanthropy.  In  politics,  he  has  had  the  cour- 
age and  the  constancy  to  remain  so  absolutely  neutral  that 
no  one  knows  what  his  political  predilections  are.  For  fifty 
years  he  had,  in  general,  superb  good  health,  a  gay  genial 


QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  429 

disposition,  a  wonderful  capacity  for  work,  and  a  power  of 
endurance  and  activity  which,  even  among  young  English- 
men, was  considered  amazing. 

He  visited  Canada  and  the  United  States  in  the  days  of 
President  Buchanan ;  and,  immediately  after  his  father's 
death,  he  went  to  the  Holy  Land.  He  was  accompanied  to 
the  East  by  a  suite  of  gentlemen,  among  whom  was  Dean 
Stanley.  The  Dean  published,  on  his  return,  a  volume 
containing  the  sermons  he  had  preached  before  the  Prince, 
during  their  journey,  on  the  spots  where  Biblical  events  had 
taken  place ;  and  in  the  appendix  was  a  very  interesting 
account  of  the  Samaritan  Passover,  and  of  the  visit  they 
paid  to  Hebron  and  the  Cave  of  Machpelah,  where  they 
were,  by  an  especial  firman  from  the  Sultan,  permitted  to 
enter  the  mosque  built  over  the  cave,  and  view  the  shrines 
of  Sarah,  Abraham,  Isaac  and  Rebekah,  Jacob  and  Leah, 
which  no  Christian  had  been  allowed  to  do  for  six  hundred 
years.  As  the  gates  of  the  shrine  of  Abraham  were  thrown 
open,  the  guardians  groaned  aloud,  and  the  chief  said : 
"  The  princes  of  any  other  nation  should  have  passed  over 
my  dead  body  sooner  than  enter ;  but  to  the  eldest  son  of 
the  Queen  of  England  we  are  willing  to  accord  even  this 
privilege."  Then,  turning  to  the  shrine,  he  cried :  "  O 
Abraham,  Friend  of  God  !  forgive  this  intrusion." 

Into  the  real  cave  they  were  not  permitted  to  descend, 
but  were  suffered  to  bend  over  an  aperture  left  open,  that 
the  holy  air  from  it,  coming  up  into  the  mosque,  might  be 
sniffed  by  devout  worshippers. 

Even  before  the  Prince  Consort's  death  the  Princess 
Alexandra  of  Denmark  had  been  thought  of  as  the 
Prince  of  Wales's  bride.  Her  father,  Prince  Christian 
of  Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderberg-Gliicksberg,  was  only  a 
distant  relative  of  the  childless  King  of  Denmark  when 
selected  by  him  as  his  heir-presumptive.  Even  as  heir- 
presumptive  his  revenues  did  not  exceed  $4,500  a  year; 
but  his  children  have  been  all  advanced  to  high  posi- 
tions. The  Princess  Alexandra  may  probably  be  Queen  of 
England ;  Princess  Dagmar  is  Empress  of  Russia ;  Prince 


43O    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

George  is  King  of  Greece ;  Princess  Thyra  married  the 
Duke  of  Cumberland,  the  dispossessed  King  of  Hanover; 
Prince  Waldemar  has  married  the  great-granddaughter  of 
Louis  Philippe,  the  rich  and  beautiful  Princess  Marie, 
daughter  of  the  Due  de  Chartres. 

The  Princess  of  Wales  has  always  shown  exquisite  taste 
in  dress.  She  and  her  sisters,  in  their  days  of  princely 
poverty,  are  said  to  have  been  their  own  dressmakers  and 
milliners.  The  accomplishment  that  in  her  girlhood  most 
distinguished  her  was  music  :  she  is  an  admirable  pianist. 
But  she  is  sadly  deaf,  —  which  may  be  very  inconvenient  to 
her  when  she  reaches  the  throne.  The  Queen  and  all  her 
husband's  family  have  been  always  very  fond  of  her,  and  she 
is  extremely  popular  with  the  English  people.  I  think 
they  are  thankful  that  she  is  not  a  German  bride. 

On  March  7,  1863,  "the  sea-king's  daughter  from  over 
the  sea"  landed  at  Gravesend,  and  was  met  there  by  the 
Prince  of  Wales  and  his  mother's  cousin,  the  Duke  of  Cam- 
bridge. A  magnificent  pageant  escorted  her  through  London, 
and  she  then  proceeded  to  Windsor,  where  the  Queen  (too 
recently  a  widow  to  take  part  in  a  public  fete)  met  and 
welcomed  her.  Three  days  later  she  was  married. 

The  Prince  of  Wales's  country  residence  is  at  Sandring- 
ham,  in  Norfolk.  It  is  said  that  Prince  Albert  selected  it 
for  his  son  because,  being  quite  off  the  route  of  travellers, 
it  is  one  of  the  quietest  places  in  England.  Here  the 
family  leads  a  country  life,  greatly  beloved  by  its  neighbors, 
tenants,  and  the  villagers.  The  Prince  and  his  guests 
hunt  with  the  neighboring  gentry,  and  entertain  them  in  a 
country-neighborly  way.  Sandringham,  instead  of  being  a 
centre  of  intrigue,  such  as  has  too  often  clustered  round  an 
heir-apparent,  is  a  real  home,  where  the  Prince  (in  spite 
of  his  crop  of  wild  oats)  is  a  most  affectionate  husband  and 
father,  surrounding  himself  with  literary  men  and  artists, 
noblemen  of  refined  tastes,  and  distinguished  foreigners. 

Eight  years  after  his  marriage  the  Prince  of  Wales  was 
taken  desperately  ill  with  typhoid  fever.  He  contracted  it 
at  a  friend's  hunting-lodge,  from  imperfect  drainage.  All 


PRftVCESS   OF  WALES. 


QUEEN   VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  431 

England  was  filled  with  anxiety,  and  the  Queen  and  his 
sisters  hastened  to  his  sick  bed. 

"  I  shall  never  resist  illness,"  said  Prince  Albert  once  to 
the  Queen.  "  You  would  struggle,  but  I  should  succumb." 
The  Prince  of  Wales,  as  his  mother  would  have  done,  fought 
hard  for  his  life.  But  great  as  his  vitality  was,  the  doctors 
despaired  of  saving  him.  Nothing  they  could  do  would 
make  him  sleep.  At  this  crisis  an  old  woman  presented 
herself  at  the  gate  of  Sandringham  with  a  hop  pillow.  If  it 
might  be  put  under  his  head,  she  was  sure  it  would  be 
of  service  to  him.  The  hop  pillow  was  used  accordingly ; 
the  Prince  slept,  and  recovered. 

There  is  a  white  marble  slab  in  the  parish  church  at  Sand- 
ringham, recording  in  simple  beautiful  words  the  thankfulness 
of  his  wife  for  his  recovery.  When  the  fever  left  him,  she 
rose  in  the  early  morning  from  beside  his  bed,  and,  with 
one  of  her  ladies,  walked  across  the  fields  to  early  morning 
service,  that  in  God's  house  she  might  return  thanks  that 
her  husband  was  spared  to  her. 

It  is  said  that  the  general  feeling  in  England,  on  the  day 
when  the  Prince  went  to  St.  Paul's  to  return  public  thanks  for 
his  recovery,  produced  a  deep  impression  upon  foreigners. 

When  he  was  thirty-four,  and  in  the  prime  of  life,  he  went 
to  India  on  a  species  of  embassy,  —  the  representative  to 
the  natives  of  India  of  her  who  a  few  months  later  would  be 
proclaimed  their  Empress-Queen.  He  arrived  there  accom- 
panied by  men  of  tried  experience  and  ability,  and  nothing 
was  neglected  that  could  add  brilliancy  to  his  reception.  He 
enjoyed  everything  like  the  most  eager  of  tourists,  but  at 
the  same  time,  in  all  that  concerned  official  life  and  public 
affairs  he  showed  the  tact,  earnestness,  and  dignity  which 
befitted  his  position. 

He  has,  like  his  mother,  a  beautiful  voice,  when  reading 
or  speaking.  In  India  his  activity,  energy,  curiosity  to  ob- 
serve, and  powers  of  endurance,  surprised  everybody.  He 
knocked  up  his  suite  repeatedly,  but  he  himself  was  always 
on  the  alert,  and  ready  for  everything. 

Yet,  though  genial,  easy,  and  kindly  in  all  social  inter- 


432    ENGLAND  IN   THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

course,  the  Prince  of  Wales  never  permits  any  one  to  pre- 
sume upon  his  kindliness,  or  to  forget  good  manners.  Then 
his  dignity  at  once  asserts  itself. 

He  has  four  living  children.  One  died  in  infancy ;  and 
his  eldest  son,  Albert  Victor,  Duke  of  Clarence  and  Avon- 
dale,  died  January  14,  1892,  on  the  eve  of  his  marriage. 
His  brother,  George  Frederick,  the  Duke  of  York,  married, 
eighteen  months  later,  Princess  May  of  Teck,  his  intended 
bride,  and  he  and  his  infant  son,  Prince  Edward,  are  now  in 
the  line  of  succession.  The  Prince  of  Wales's  eldest  daugh- 
ter, Princess  Louise,  married,  in  1889,  the  Duke  of  Fife, 
and  has  two  daughters.  The  Princesses  Victoria  and  Maud 
are  still  unmarried.  The  health  of  the  latter  is  delicate. 

In  1884  the  two  young  Princes,  Eddy  (for  that  is  the  name 
by  which  Prince  Albert  Victor  was  known  in  his  family)  and 
George,  were  sent  in  an  English  warship  to  visit  Australia ; 
during  their  long  voyage  their  mornings  were  to  be  passed 
in  studies  bearing  on  Australia  and  the  colonies.  Here  is 
an  extract  from  one  of  Prince  George's  letters,  giving  an 
account  of  a  visit  they  paid  to  an  Australian  proprietor : 

"  Some  of  us,"  he  writes,  "  went  on  horseback,  some  in  car- 
riages. The  first  night  we  slept  nine  in  one  room.  In  the  first 
half  hour  after  reaching  our  destination  Eddy  killed  two  kanga- 
roos, and  I  three.  These  creatures  are  so  numerous  that,  though 
their  fur  would  be  valuable,  hunters  only  cut  off  their  tails,  which 
make  admirable  soup,  and  which  are  sold  for  a  few  pence.  Kan- 
garoos have  great  difficulty  in  turning  round  ;  for  this  reason  they 
never  try  to  shun  those  who  attack  them,  but  rush  upon  them ; 
and  in  this  way  many  make  their  escape  through  the  broken 
ranks  of  the  hunters.  They  devour  the  grass  needed  for  the 
sheep.  On  the  estate  where  we  were  (about  twenty-five  thousand 
acres)  four  thousand  were  killed  last  year.  We  took  one  alive, 
and  a  baby  kangaroo  from  its  mother's  pocket.  When  not  at 
full  speed,  they  use  their  tails  as  a  lever.  There  are  other 
animals  of  the  same  species,  smaller,  and  using  their  tails 
differently  from  the  kangaroo." 

The  next  child  of  the  Queen  was  the  one  who  was  most 
beloved  by  the  English  nation,  Princess  Alice  Maud  Mary, 
Grand- Duchess  of  Hesse-Darmstadt.  From  her  earliest 


QUEEN   VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  433 

childhood  she  enjoyed  popularity  even  greater  than  that 
bestowed  on  other  members  of  her  royal  house ;  and  after 
the  death  of  her  father  she  was  invested  in  English  eyes  with 
even  a  more  tender  interest.  She  was  with  her  father  in  his 
latest  hours ;  she  comforted  and  supported  her  mother  in 
the  first  dark  days  of  her  affliction ;  and  she  watched  beside 
her  brother's  sick-bed  even  when  she  had  husband  and 
children  of  her  own.  Her  Life  and  Letters,  published  in 
German,  and  translated  by  her  sister,  the  Princess  Helena, 
is  a  book  to  touch  all  hearts,  and  was  read  eagerly  when 
it  came  out,  in  1884. 

Alice  herself,  speaking  of  the  day  of  the  Duchess  of 
Kent's  death,  writes  to  her  mother :  — 

"  From  that  day  dated  the  commencement  of  so  much  grief, 
so  much  sorrow;  but  in  those  days  you  had  one,  dearest  mamma, 
whose  first  and  deepest  thought  was  to  comfort  and  help  you, 
and  I  saw  and  understood  only  then  how  he  watched  over  you  ! 
I  see  his  dear  face,  so  tearful  and  so  pale,  when  he  led  me  to  you 
early  that  morning,  and  said,  'Comfort  mamma;'  as  if  these 
words  were  a  presage  of  what  was  to  come.  In  those  days  I 
think  he  knew  how  deep  my  love  was  for  you,  and  that  as  long 
as  I  was  left  in  my  home,  my  first  and  only  thought  should  be 
you  and  you  alone.  This  I  held  as  my  holiest  and  dearest  duty, 
till  I  had  to  leave  you,  my  beloved  mother.  But  that  bond  of 
love,  though  I  can  no  longer  be  near  you,  is  as  strong  as  ever." 

For  the  first  few  days  after  her  father's  death  Princess 
Alice  took  everything  into  her  own  hands,  to  save  the  Queen 
even  communications  with  the  Government  and  the  house- 
hold. "  She  is  our  Angel  in  the  House,"  wrote  one  of  the 
ladies-in-waiting. 

She  had  been  engaged  some  months  before  her  father's 
death  to  Prince  Louis  of  Hesse,  the  future  Grand-Duke 
of  Darmstadt.  The  marriage  was  celebrated  quietly  at 
Osborne  July  i,  1862. 

The  world  never  learned  to  regard  Prince  Louis  with 
entire  admiration,  but  his  wife  adored  him.  "  You  tell  me 
to  speak  of  my  happiness  —  our  happiness,"  she  writes  to 
the  Queen.  "  If  I  say  I  love  my  dear  husband,  that  is 

28 


434    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

scarcely  enough.  It  is  a  love  and  esteem  which  increases 
daily.  What  was  life  before,  to  what  it  has  become  to  me 
now?  " 

There  is  no  need  to  dwell  upon  the  life  she  found  so 
happy.  The  young  people  were  very  poor  for  their  posi- 
tion, and  Princess  Alice's  life  was  a  combination  of  the 
Princess  and  the  house-mother  who  pulls  hard  at  both 
ends  of  her  income  to  make  them  meet.  She  was  inter- 
ested in  art,  in  literature,  and  in  learned  men.  At  one 
time  Strauss  almost  led  her  away  from  the  faith  of  her 
girlhood;  but  she  was  saved  by  fresh  experience  of  her 
need  of  a  personal  God  and  Saviour,  in  hours  of  anxiety 
and  sorrow.  Her  especial  mission  she  considered  to  be 
the  improvement  of  the  condition  of  women.  Sanitary 
matters  also  claimed  her  attention.  Alas  !  that  her  cares 
had  not  extended  in  this  matter  to  the  Ducal  Palace  at 
Darmstadt. 

In  the  Prusso- Austrian  war  of  1866,  and  in  the  Franco- 
Prussian  war  of  1870,  she  founded  the  Woman's  Union,  to 
assist  in  nursing  and  relieving  soldiers  in  time  of  war,  and 
in  peace  to  train  nurses  and  assist  in  hospitals.  All  sorts 
of  other  benevolent  institutions  she  established,  —  schools 
for  idiots,  kindergartens,  societies  for  the  employment  of 
women.  She  went  herself  among  the  poor  in  their  own 
houses,  and  she  was  the  most  devoted  and  untiring  of 
mothers.  She  did  too  much,  for  she  was  rarely  well.  It 
pains  us  to  hear  her  say  :  "  I  have  made  all  the  summer 
out-walking  dresses,  seven  in  number,  —  not  embroidered, 
but  made  from  beginning  to  end  ;  likewise  the  new  neces- 
sary flannel  shawls  for  the  expected.  I  manage  all  the 
nursery  accounts  and  everything  myself,  which  gives  me 
plenty  to  do." 

In  the  war  of  1866  Prince  Louis  served  with  the  Austrian 
army  against  Prussia.  In  1870  he  was  on  the  Prussian  side 
in  the  army  corps  of  his  wife's  brother-in-law. 

A  terrible  sorrow  to  Princess  Alice  was  the  fall  out  of  a 
window  in  June,  1873,  of  her  little  boy  Fritz,  while  looking 
at  a  military  procession.  The  child's  death  took  place,  as 


DUKE    OF  YORK. 


QUEEN   VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  435 

it  were,  in  his  mother's  presence.     In  reference  to  it  she 
quotes  some  lines  from  a  German  poet. 

"  Now  unto  you  the  Lord  has  done 

That  which  we  wished  to  do ; 
We  would  have  trained  you  up,  —  and  now 
'T  is  we  are  trained  by  you. 

"  With  grief  and  tears,  O  children, 

Do  you  your  parents  train, 
And  lure  us  on  and  up  to  you, 
To  meet  in  Heaven  again." 

The  loss  of  little  Fritz  was  terribly  felt  by  Ernest,  his  next 
brother.  Their  mother  writes  to  their  grandmother  :  — 

"  Yesterday  Ernie  was  telling  his  nurse  that  I  was  going  to 
plant  some  Spanish  chestnuts,  and  she  said,  '  Oh,  I  shall  be  dead 
and  gone  before  they  are  big.'  Ernie  burst  out  crying,  and 
said,  '  No !  you  must  not  die  alone ;  I  don't  like  people  to  die 
alone.  We  must  all  die  together.'  It  is  the  remaining  behind 
the  loss,  the  missing  of  the  dear  ones,  that  is  the  cruel  thing  to 
bear.  Only  time  can  teach  one  that,  and  resignation  to  a  higher 
will." 

They  came  near  all  fulfilling  little  Ernie's  wish,  and  dying 
together.  Prince  Louis  became  Grand-Duke  of  Darmstadt, 
and  the  Grand-Ducal  Palace,  like  most  mediaeval  buildings, 
was  ill- drained.  The  children  and  their  father  sickened 
with  diphtheria.  The  mother  nursed  them  with  unresting 
devotion.  One  little  darling  died.  The  mother  in  her 
agony  kissed  the  face  of  her  dying  child,  and  took  the 
infection.  She  was  too  run  down  by  nursing  and  hard 
work  to  recover.  She  died  December  14,  1878,  —  the 
anniversary  of  her  father's  death,  seventeen  years  before. 

The  Queen  has  considered  herself  the  mother  of  her 
orphaned  children,  and  has  arranged  their  marriages. 
Ernest  has  succeeded  his  father  as  Grand-Duke  of 
Darmstadt.  The  eldest  daughter,  Princess  Victoria,  has 
married  her  morganatic  cousin,  Prince  Louis  of  Batten- 
berg.  Princess  Elizabeth  has  married  the  Grand- Duke 
Sergius  of  Russia,  and  is  beloved  by  the  imperial  family, 


436    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

and  unhappy  in  her  husband.  Princess  Irene,  the  third 
sister,  has  married  Prince  Henry  of  Prussia ;  and  Princess 
Alix  is  not  yet  married. 

Queen  Victoria's  fourth  child  was  Prince  Alfred,  the 
Duke  of  Edinburgh,  who,  on  the  recent  death  of  his  uncle, 
his  father's  brother,  became  the  reigning  Duke  of  Saxe- 
Coburg-Gotha.  In  England  he  is  Admiral  of  the  Fleet. 
He  must  be  a  man  of  courage,  for  in  1883  he  was  con- 
spicuous at  the  dangerous  ceremony  of  the  coronation  of 
the  Emperor  Alexander  III.  of  Russia.  He  had  married 
the  Grand- Duchess  Marie,  sister  of  the  Emperor,  and  only 
daughter  of  Alexander  II. ;  for  English  law  permits  the 
marriage  of  one  of  the  royal  family  with  a  member  of  the 
Greek  Church,  though  not  with  a  Roman  Catholic.  The 
Prince  is  said  to  have  great  skill  as  a  musician  ;  but  he  and 
his  sister,  the  Princess  Christian,  seem  to  be  less  known  to 
the  public  than  any  of  their  family.  He  and  his  wife  have 
one  son  and  four  daughters,  —  Prince  Alfred,  now  twenty 
years  old ;  Princess  Marie,  wife  to  Prince  Ferdinand,  heir- 
presumptive  to  the  throne  of  Roumania ;  Princess  Victoria 
Melita,  married  recently  to  the  Grand  Duke  of  Hesse- 
Darmstadt  ;  and  Princesses  Alexandra  and  Beatrice,  who 
are  still  in  the  schoolroom.  Their  mother,  the  Grand- 
Duchess,  is  said  to  care  little  for  gayety,  but  to  be  stately, 
reserved,  and  melancholy,  —  which  is  not  surprising  in  a 
member  of  the  Russian  imperial  family,  for  all  her  re- 
lations walk  in  dread  of  dynamite.  Nor  is  she  exempt 
from  danger.  A  few  years  since,  the  Russian  consul  at 
Malta,  an  unsuspected  Nihilist,  was  instrumental  in  putting 
an  explosive  into  her  box  at  the  opera. 

Princess  Helena  —  or,  as  she  is  now  called,  Princess 
Christian  —  is  an  admirable  translator,  and  must  be  a  very 
sensible  woman,  judging  by  what  she  writes,  which  is  always 
in  the  best  taste  possible.  She  is  evidently  the  darling  of 
her  sisters,  and  was  her  mother's  secretary,  companion,  and 
daughter  at  home  after  the  departure  of  the  Princess  Alice. 
Rumor  says  that  Prince  Christian  was  brought  to  the  Queen's 
notice  by  her  seeing  him  much  affected  at  the  unveiling  of 


QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  437 

a  statue  of  the  Prince  Consort,  and  that  this  led  to  her 
thinking  of  him  as  a  suitor  for  her  daughter ;  besides,  she 
wanted  a  husband  for  her  Helena  ("  Lenchen  "  her  family 
call  her)  who  would  not  take  her  from  England.  The 
Prince  of  Wales  opposed  the  marriage,  one  of  his  reasons 
being  that  Prince  Christian  was  of  the  branch  of  the  royal 
family  of  Denmark  opposed  to  that  of  the  reigning  family, 
to  which  Princess  Alexandra  belongs.  Prince  Christian  is 
a  somewhat  elderly  man,  and  has  never  been  a  great  favor- 
ite bin  England,  though  the  ready  good- nature  of  his  wife 
makes  her  extremely  popular.  She  presides  at  numberless 
fancy  bazaars  and  other  charitable  associations.  They  were 
married  in  1866,  and  have  two  sons  and  two  daughters; 
one  of  the  latter,  Princess  Louise,  was  married  in  1891  to 
Prince  Aribert  of  Anhalt. 

Princess  Louise,  the  next  daughter  of  Queen  Victoria, 
was  married  in  March,  1871,  to  John,  Marquis  of  Lome, 
eldest  son  of  the  Duke  of  Argyll.  The  Queen  was  very 
fond  of  the  Duchess  of  Argyll,  and  it  is  said  that  the  two 
mothers  planned  the  match  when  the  Marquis  and  the 
Princess  were  both  children.  In  the  Queen's  book  on  their 
family  life  in  the  Highlands  she  relates  the  courtship,  and 
"  how  Louise  came  and  told  her  of  her  engagement,  and  of 
Lome's  expressions  of  devotion  to  her."  The  match  was 
immensely  popular  in  England.  Archibald  Forbes  relates 
how,  when  he  rode  into  Paris  after  the  siege  in  1871,  the 
first  question  of  all  the  English  he  met  was,  "  Is  the  Princess 
Louise  married  ?  " 

The  marriage  has  been  childless ;  nor  does  the  Marquis 
(heir  to  the  most  distinguished  name  in  Scotland)  seem  to 
have  fulfilled  the  extravagant  expectations  some  people  had 
formed  of  him.  He  and  the  Princess  went  out  to  Canada, 
the  Marquis  being  appointed  Governor- General.  But  his 
administration  was  not  successful ;  nor  does  the  Princess 
seem  to  have  adapted  herself  to  Canadian  ways. 

The  Princess  Louise  is  an  especial  patroness  of  art 
needlework  and  the  South  Kensington  Museum.  Her  face 
is  distinguished  by  its  fine  intellectual  profile,  and  her  figure 


438    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

for  its  graceful  pose.  "  The  Princess  is  exceedingly  sym- 
pathetic, merry,  and  light-hearted,"  writes  Mr.  Motley  in 
1877.  "She  has  decided  artistic  talents,  —  draws,  paints, 
and  models,  and  does  your  likeness  in  a  few  sittings  very 
successfully.  Nobody  could  be  a  kinder  or  more  graceful 
hostess." 

Prince  Arthur  William  Patrick,  Duke  of  Connaught,  was 
"  a  dear,  bright  little  fellow  "  in  his  baby  days,  and  godson, 
and  namesake  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  —  as  charming  a 
compliment  as  ever  was  paid  to  a  subject  by  a  sovereign. 
He  is  a  general  in  the  English  army,  and  has  been  in  com- 
mand of  the  camp  at  Aldershot.  He  married  the  Princess 
Louise  Marguerite,  daughter  of  Prince  Frederick  Charles  of 
Prussia,  —  the  Red  Prince,  who  won  renown  next  to  Von 
Moltke  in  the  Seven  Weeks'  War  and  the  Franco-Prussian 
campaigns.  They  were  married  in  1879,  and  have  three 
children.  The  Prince's  name  and  title  led  to  the  conclu- 
sion that  it  was  hoped  to  associate  him  with  the  government 
and  pacification  of  Ireland ;  but  the  post  has  proved  too 
difficult,  and  the  design  too  hopeless,  for  any  administration 
to  put  the  lord-lieutenancy  into  his  hands. 

In  1882,  the  Duke  was  in  Egypt  with  General  Sir  Garnet 
Wolseley,  and  at  the  battle  of  Tel-el-Kebir  fought  against 
Arabi  Pasha,  heading  a  brigade  of  the  Guards  in  the  night 
march  and  assault  on  a  very  strong  position. 

The  Queen,  who  was  at  Balmoral,  knew  the  battle  was 
impending,  and  she  wrote  in  her  Journal :  — 

"  How  anxious  we  felt  I  cannot  say,  but  we  tried  not  to  give 
way.  I  prayed  earnestly  for  my  darling  child,  and  longed  for 
the  morrow  to  arrive.  Read  Korner's  beautiful  '  Prayer  before 
the  Battle,'  — '  Father,  I  call  on  Thee.'  My  beloved  husband 
used  to  sing  it  often.  My  thoughts  were  entirely  fixed  on  Egypt 
and  the  coming  battle.  My  nerves  were  strained  to  such  a 
pitch  by  the  intensity  of  my  anxiety  and  suspense  that  they 
seemed  to  feel  as  if  they  were  all  alive." 

At  last  came  a  telegram  announcing  the  victory,  with  a 
postscript  from  Sir  Garnet :  — 


DUCHESS   OF  YORK. 


QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  439 

"Duke  of  Connaught  is  well.  Behaved  admirably,  leading 
his  brigade  to  the  attack." 

"  I  carried  it,"  says  the  Queen,  "to  Beatrice,  where  Louischen 
[the  Duchess  of  Connaught]  was,  and  I  showed  it  to  her, 
embracing  her  warmly,  saying  what  joy  and  pride  and  sense 
of  thankfulness  it  was  to  know  our  darling  safe,  and  so  much 
praised." 

Queen  Victoria's  eighth  child  was  Prince  Leopold,  on 
whom  was  conferred  the  ever-unlucky  title  of  Duke  of 
Albany.  He  was  delicate  from  his  birth,  in  a  manner 
that  made  the  smallest  wound  or  scratch  a  serious  matter. 
He  lived  almost  entirely  under  the  care  of  Colonel  Grey, 
and  the  English  public  believed  that  in  disposition  and 
turn  of  thought  he  was  the  one  of  the  Queen's  sons  who 
most  resembled  his  father. 

At  one  time  there  was  some  talk  of  his  taking  orders. 
He  was  known  to  the  public  by  his  excellent  speeches,  and 
he  was  frequently  called  upon  to  make  them  on  occasions 
of  public  interest. 

He  went  to  Oxford,  though  his  health  had  prevented  his 
going,  as  he  wished,  to  Eton.  He  was  forever  cut  off  from 
the  sports  and  athletic  exercises  of  other  young  men,  in 
which  he  took  great  interest,  and  of  which  he  seemed 
extremely  fond.  During  all  his  short  life  he  associated 
as  much  as  possible  with  "  great  men,  —  men  of  renown." 
Mr.  Ruskin  was  fond  of  him ;  and  Prince  Leopold  said 
that  he  had  "  never  looked  up  with  such  reverence  to  any 
man  as  he  did  to  Ruskin." 

In  1879,  ne  rnoved  his  personal  establishment  to  Clare- 
mont,  a  house  always  associated  with  sorrow.  He  was  a 
loving  brother  to  his  sisters,  and  a  tender  uncle  to  his 
orphaned  nieces  at  Darmstadt.  In  1882,  he  married 
Princess  Helen  of  Waldeck,  a  lady  gentle,  good,  and 
gracious,  who  since  her  own  widowhood  has  filled  the 
place  of  a  daughter  to  the  widowed  Queen. 

Prince  Leopold  had  been  somewhat  out  of  health  in 
1884,  and  went  to  Cannes,  a  place  he  was  fond  of,  to 
recover.  At  Cannes,  in  his  boyhood,  he  had  had  a  strange 


44O    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

psychological  experience,  and  it  is  probable  that  this  was 
repeated,  for  a  friend  says  :  — 

"The  Duke,  two  days  before  his  death,  would talk  to  me  of 
death,  and  said  he  would  like  a  military  funeral.  In  fact,  I  had 
great  difficulty  in  getting  him  off  that  subject.  At  last  I  asked 
him  why  he  talked  on  this  matter.  He  was  interrupted  at  the 
moment,  but  said  :  '  I  will  tell  you  later.'  I  never  saw  him  to 
speak  to  again,  but  he  finished  his  answer  to  me  to  another  lady. 
'  For  two  nights,'  he  said,  '  Princess  Alice  has  appeared  to  me  in 
my  dreams,  and  says  she  is  quite  happy,  and  wants  me  to  come 
and  join  her.  That  is  what  makes  me  so  thoughtful.'  " 

He  went  out  that  night  alone,  without,  as  usual,  a  gentle- 
man in  attendance.  Returning,  he  stumbled  on  the  marble 
steps  of  the  hotel,  owing,  it  is  believed,  to  vertigo  or 
apoplexy,  and  fell,  injuring  his  head.  He  died  in  a  few 
hours. 

He  left  a  little  daughter,  and  had  a  posthumous  son. 

The  youngest  of  the  Queen's  children  is  Princess  Beatrice, 
now  thirty-seven  years  of  age.  Her  face  is  full  of  character. 
"  Baby  "  they  long  called  her  in  her  home  circle,  and  the 
family  letters  and  journals  are  full  of  her  sweet  baby  ways 
and  little  accomplishments. 

She  grew  up  to  be  her  mother's  especial  companion, 
absorbed  in  all  the  joys,  cares,  and  sorrows  of  the  Queen. 
The  world  said  there  was  an  attachment  between  Princess 
Beatrice  and  the  Prince  Imperial,  and  the  story  appears  to 
have  some  color,  from  entries  concerning  the  sad  tragedy 
of  his  death  in  her  mother's  Journal.  It  was  also  said  that 
the  Queen  was  anxious  that  Princess  Beatrice  should  be  the 
second  wife  of  the  widowed  husband  of  Princess  Alice; 
and  with  that  view  used  her  personal  influence  to  get  the 
bill  permitting  marriage  with  a  deceased  wife's  sister  to  pass 
through  Parliament.  Meantime  the  Duke  of  Darmstadt 
had  formed  other  views ;  he  desired  to  contract  a  morga- 
natic marriage  with  Madame  Kole"mine,  the  divorced  wife 
of  a  Russian  diplomatist.  This  marriage  the  Queen  broke 
off,  considering  it  an  insult  to  the  memory  of  her  daughter ; 


QUEEN  VICTORIA'S  JUBILEE.  441 

and,  although  the  Grand  Duke  had  been  married  to  Ma- 
dame Kolemine,  he  was  divorced  from  her  in  the  Hessian 
courts. 

Princess  Beatrice  is  a  charming  artist,  and  once  pub- 
lished a  beautiful  birthday  book,  illustrated  by  her  own 
drawings.  She  loves  bric-a-brac,  old  lace,  and  such  mat- 
ters, and  says  of  herself  she  could  find  it  in  her  heart  to 
have  as  many  gowns  as  Queen  Elizabeth.  Some  one  who 
saw  her  with  her  mother  a  few  years  since  in  the  little 
church  at  Aix  said  that  her  care  of  that  dear  mother  made 
a  pretty  picture.  "  She  seemed  to  be  listening,  watching, 
breathing  for  the  Queen ;  not  in  a  fussy,  irritating  manner ; 
but  with  the  most  genuine  consideration  she  would  steal 
her  hand  into  that  of  her  mother,  hand  her  a  fan,  pull  up 
her  shawl,  give  her  a  cordial  little  smile." 

Princess  Beatrice  has  married  Prince  Henry  of  Batten- 
berg,  who  is  handsome  and  well  educated.  Before  his  mar- 
riage he  was  an  officer  in  a  Prussian  regiment,  with  only 
slender  pay.  But  the  marriage  was  celebrated  with  much 
pomp  in  July,  1885,  the  young  Princesses  of  Wales  then 
making  their  first  appearance  in  public  as  their  aunt's  brides- 
maids; together  with  Princess  Irene  of  Hesse,  who  has 
since  married  Prince  Henry  of  Prussia.  By  the  way,  there 
must  be  considerable  fraternal  affection  between  this  Prus- 
sian Prince  and  his  eccentric  brother  the  Emperor,  for  the 
Prince,  when  his  first  child  was  born  at  Kiel,  held  him  up 
at  once  to  the  telephone,  that  his  voice  might  be  heard  at 
Potsdam  by  his  imperial  uncle. 

Princess  Beatrice  and  Prince  Henry  of  Battenberg 
have  three  sons  and  a  daughter.  The  Princess  and 
her  family  form,  generally,  part  of  the  household  of  the 
Queen. 

At  the  Jubilee  on  June  21,  1887,  the  Queen,  as  she  sat 
in  regal  state  to  receive  the  homage  of  her  children  and 
grandchildren  on  that  spot  where  she  assumed  her  royal 
robes  fifty  years  before,  must  have  been  a  touching  sight  to 
all  beholders.  Long  and  blameless  has  been  her  reign, 
marked  on  her  own  part  by  rare  tact  and  self-denial. 


442    ENGLAND  IN  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

Queen  Victoria  alone  of  English  queens  regnant  has 
been  a  mother  and  a  queen  at  the  same  time.  Elizabeth, 
Mary  Tudor,  and  the  second  Mary  were  childless.  Queen 
Anne  had  had  the  misfortune  to  lose  all  her  children  before 
she  ascended  the  throne. 


NOTE  TO  PAGE  294. 

A  dear  friend  who  has  been  much  in  India,  and  who  shares  the 
enthusiasm  widely  felt  for  Hodson's  splendid  services,  is  desirous  I 
should  add  to  the  account  of  Hodson's  court-martial  (largely  taken 
from  the  English  "  National  Review,"  though  elsewhere  well  corrobo- 
rated) the  opinion  of  his  friends  Lord  Napier  and  Sir  R.  Montgom- 
ery concerning  the  charges  brought  against  him  of  dishonesty.  Lord 
Napier  says :  "  The  result  of  Major  Taylor's  laborious  and  patient 
investigation  of  Lieutenant  Hodson's  regimental  accounts  has  fully 
justified,  but  not  at  all  added  to,  the  confidence  I  have  throughout 
maintained  in  the  honor  and  uprightness  of  his  conduct."  Sir  R. 
Montgomery  (Chief  Commissioner  in  Oude)  writes:  "The  whole 
report  of  Major  Taylor  seemed  more  satisfactory  than  any  I  ever  read ; 
and,  considering  Major  Taylor's  high  character  and  the  pains  he  took 
to  investigate  every  detail,  it  must  prove  triumphant."  Major  Tay- 
lor's report  was  made  in  February,  1856,  but  it  was  never  submitted 
to  the  Government  of  India  till  March,  1857,  on  the  eve  of  the 
Mutiny.  Lord  Dalhousie  left  India  having  heard  the  charges,  but  not 
the  vindication.  Hodson's  old  schoolfellow,  Mr.  Thomas  Hughes, 
wrote  in  his  vindication  shortly  after  his  death  in  the  "  Edinburgh 
Review,"  and  General  Anson  and  Sir  Henry  Lawrence  also  stood 
by  him. 


INDEX. 


INDEX. 


Abderrahman  Khan,  375, 376, 383-386. 

Adam,  Dr.,  112, 

Adams,  John  Quincy,  interview  with 
George  III.,  28,  29. 

Adelaide,  Queen,  wife  of  William  IV., 
37,  158,  202,  239. 

Afghanistan,  168-171. 

Agra,  269-272,  310. 

Akbar  Khan,  178,  179,  181-184,  '94- 

Albany,  Leopold,  Duke  of,  439,  440 ; 
Duchess  of,  72,  439. 

Albert,  Prince  Consort,  40,  146-149; 
his  letters,  149,  150, 153,  154,  157, 
241,  324,  326,  329 ;  engagement, 
150-153;  marriage  day,  154,  155; 
married  life,  155,  156  ;  connection 
with  the  Exhibition,  227-237;  his 
character,  253,  325;  his  excessive 
labors,  326-328,  332,  333,  336,  339; 
his  death-bed,  339-342. 

Alexander  the  Great",  336. 

Alexandra.     See  Princess  of  Wales. 

Alexandria,  429,  430. 

Alfred,  Prince.     See  Edinburgh. 

Alice,  Grand-Duchess  of  Hesse-Darm- 
stadt, 318,  326,  432-435- 

Alison,  Sir  Archibald,  quoted,  179, 
180,  213. 

Almshouses,  201. 

Althorp,  Lord,  108-111. 

Ameers  of  Scinde,  207-209. 

Amelia,  Princess,  25,  26. 
America  in  1822,  12. 
American  Civil  War,  358,  399. 
Anti-Jacobin,  So,  81. 


Arah,  leaguer  of,  269. 

Arthur,  Prince.     .&?«  Connaught . 

Asgad,  300. 

Ashley,  Lord,  16,  17,  18. 

Auckland,  Lord,  171,  172,  189. 

Augusta,  Princess,  32,  33,  34. 

Aurungzebe,  257. 

Azful  Khan,  375. 

Azim  Khan,  374,  375,  376. 

Azimoolah  Khan,  285,  286. 


B 

Bagehot.  Walter,  quoted,  96,  in. 

Bala-Hissar,  178,  179,  384. 

Baly,  Dr.,  337. 

Banks,  Major,  298. 

Barnard,  Simon,  319,  320. 

Bashi-Bazouks,  362. 

Bayard,  Mr.,  221. 

Beaconsfield,  Earl  of.     See  Disraeli. 

Countess  of,  354,  355,  356. 
Beatrice,  Princess,  440,  441. 
Bed  Chamber  dispute,  138,  139. 
Beloochistan,  366. 
Bentinck,  Lord  George,  219,  352,  356, 

357 

Bismarck,  Prince,  369,  419-423,  426. 
Bolan  Pass,  171-173. 
Bokhara,  196,  199. 
Bombay,  279,  282. 
Bright,  John,  207,  400. 
Bristol  riots,  105-108. 
Browning,  Mrs.,  18. 
Brougham,  Henry,  Lord,  111-114. 
Broughton,  Lord,  99,  100,  126-130. 


446 


INDEX. 


Brydon,  Dr.,  183,  184,  300. 
Bulgaria,  massacres  in,  359. 
Bulwer,  Edward  (Lord  Lytton),  397. 
Burnes,  Sir  Alexander,  169,  171,  176, 

177. 

Byrd,  Colonel,  47. 
Byron,  Lord,  45,  132. 


c. 

Cabul  (1839),  174  et  seq. ;  mission  to, 

18,  378»  379,  381. 
Cambridge,   Augustus,   Duke  of,   38, 

44,236;  Prince  George  of,  145,  231, 

234 ;  Princess  Mary,  see  Teck. 
Campbell,  Sir  Colin.   See  Clyde,  Lord. 
Canada,  137,  138. 
Canning,  George,  9,  10,  77,  78,  8 1,  83- 

86,  386,  390,  391. 
Canning,  Lord,  282,  309,  310. 
Carlotta,  Empress  of  Mexico,  72,  336. 
Carlyle,  Thomas,  163,  329. 
Caroline,  queen  of  George  IV.,  54-59, 

"3- 

Cartwright,  Edward,  17,  91. 

Major  John,  91. 
Castlereagh,  Lord,  14,  15,  73,  74,  76- 

79,  85. 
Catholic  Emancipation,  59,  60,  81,  90, 

91,  161. 

Cavagnari,  Sir  Louis,  268,  380,  381. 
Cawnpore,  284,  289,  298,  309,  310. 
Charlotte,  Princess  Royal.    See  Wiir- 

temberg,  Queen  of. 
Charlotte,  Princess,  wife  of   Leopold 

of  Saxe-Coburg,  35,  52,  56,  62-72. 
Charlotte,  Queen,  wife  of  George  III., 

21,  24,  26,  34,  52,  54,  64,  65,  413. 
Charter  and  Chartists,  222-224. 
Children  in  factories,  16-19. 
Chillianwallah,  216. 
Chiltem  Hundreds,  101. 
Chimney-sweeps,  15,  16. 
Chinese  war,  191,  192. 
Christian,  Mr.,  275,  276. 
Christian,  Prince.  436,  437. 
Princess.     See  Helena. 
Christians,  massacre  of  native,  in  India, 

271,  272  ;  in  Bulgaria,  359. 
Claremont,  70-72. 


Clarence,  Duke  of.     See  William  IV. ; 

Albert  Victor,  Duke  of,  432. 
Clontarf,  165. 
Clyde,  Lord,  282,  298,  303-307,  309, 

360. 

Gobbet,  William,  114-123. 
Cobden,  Mr.,  203. 
Coffin,  Sir  Isaac,  91,  221. 
Commons,  House  of,  97-101,  108,  114. 
Congress,  of  Berlin,  364,  365,  366 ;  of 

Vienna,  73,  78. 

Connaught,  Arthur,  Duke  of,  337,  438. 
Conolly,  Captain,  198,  199. 
Corn  Laws,  203,  204,  205,  352,  353, 

395- 
Coronation,  of    George   IV.,    58 ;    of 

Queen  Victoria,  139-144. 
Crimean  war,  254,  255. 
Cumberland,  Duke  of,  13,  40,  41,  128. 

See  Ernest,  King  of  Hanover. 

D. 

Dalhousie,  Lord,  265,  277,  278,  285. 

Dalrymple,  Sir  Hew,  87. 

Daniel  Deronda,  349. 

Daughters  of  George  III.,  30-36. 

Delhi,  260,  262, 263,  266,  290-293,  298 ; 
Emperor  of  Delhi,  295,  297. 

Derby,  Earl  of,  34,  87,  347. 

Dickens,  Charles,  15,  45,  164. 

Dilemma,  268. 

Disraeli,  Benjamin,  Earl  of  Beacons- 
field,  218,  320,  347-349,  350,  352, 
354-361,  366-369. 

Dost  Mohammed,  169-171,  174-176, 
192,  193.  195,  207,  373. 

Douranee  Empire,  169,  170. 

Doyle,  Sir  Francis,  390,  392. 

Dunmore,  Lord,  42,  43. 

Durham,  Lord,  137,  138. 

E. 

Earthquake,  186. 

East  India  Company,   167,  207,  256, 

257,3",357; 
Edgeworth,  Miss,  348. 
Edinburgh,   Alfred,    Duke    of,    436 ; 

Duchess  of,  436 ;  children  of,  436. 
Edward  III.,  422. 


INDEX. 


447 


Eight  Days,  263. 

Elections  in  England,  59,  60. 

Elgin,  Lord,  311. 

Eliot,  George,  334,  349. 

Elizabeth,  Princess.    See  Homburg. 

Ellenborough,    Lord,   184,    190,    191 

210,    211,    373. 

Elliott,  304. 

Elphinstone,  General,  176,  177,   179 

183,  186,  194. 

Elphinstone,  Lord,  145,  279. 
Empress  of  India,  Queen  Victoria,  360 

361. 

Endymion,  268,  269. 
England  in  1822,  9,  10,  n;  in  1832 

94-97;   in  1848,  217;    Young,  352 

353- 
Ernest,  Duke  of  Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, 

48,49,  51. 

Ernest,  King  of  Hanover,  41,  129. 
Este,  43. 

Eton,  80,  388,  390-392. 
Eton  Miscellany,  391,  392. 
Eugenie,  Empress,  318,  351. 
Eurasians,  269. 
"Europe  in  Africa,"  254,  411 
Exhibition,  the  Great,  227-239. 
Eyre,     Sir    Vincent,    180-183,    269, 

270. 


F. 

Factories,  16,  17,  18. 

Factory  children,  16-19. 

Famine  in  Ireland,  218-220. 

Farquhar,  quoted,  270-272. 

Ferozeshah,  213,  214. 

Fitzgerald.  Lord  Edward,  76. 

Fitzherbert,  Maria,  Mrs.,  48-53. 

Forster,  Mr.  W.  E.,  407. 

Fox,  Charles  James,  49,  50,  53,  54, 

77- 

France  in  1822,  10. 
French  invasion  of  Ireland,  76. 
French  Revolution,  53. 
Frederick,  Emperor  of  Germany,  422, 

423-426. 

Frederick,  Prince  of  Wales,  23. 
Fry,  Mrs.  Elizabeth,  19-22. 
Futteghur,  271,  272,  286. 


G. 

Geffecken,  Dr.  426. 

George  III.,  23-29,  31,  34,  43,412, 413. 

George  IV.,  45-48,  53-57,  58,  60,  62, 

63.  82,  83,  117,  163. 
George  V.  of  Hanover,  41,  42. 
Ghiljzees,  197,  386. 
Ghuzee,  174. 

Gladstone,  Mrs.,  401-403. 
Gladstone,  W.  E.,  112,  323,  324,  342, 

344,  345,  358,  362>   3^3,  387~4°2, 

404-410. 
Goorkas,  177. 
Gordon,  General,  406,  407. 
Gortschakoff,  Prince,  374. 
Gough,  Lord  (Sir  Hugh),  212-216. 
Greville,  Charles,  127;  quoted,  36,  63, 

140,  144. 

Grey,  Lord,  102,  108,  no,  124. 
Griffin,  Sir  Lepel,  384-386. 
Gwalior,  207,  303,  307,  310. 


H. 

Hallam,  Arthur,  388,  390,  392. 
Hardinge,  Lord,  211-215. 
Havelock,  Sir  Henry,   193,  282,  287, 

288,  298,  301,  302,  308,  309. 
Hawarden,  408. 

Haynau,  General,  217,  218,  249. 
Helena,  Princess  Christian,  436,  437. 
Henry  III.,  41^  4I2. 
Henry  of  Prussia,  441. 
Herat,  169,  170. 
Herbert  of  Muckross,  337. 
Hill,  Rowland,  Rev.,  393. 

ill,  Rowland,  221. 
fiodson,  293-297,  311. 
Holyrood,  60-63,  4J8. 
rlomburg,      Landgrave     of,    33-35: 

Landgravine  of,  33,  34,  35. 
Homer,  389,  398,  399. 
lome  Rule,  162,  404,  405,  407. 
-ludson,  220. 
Hyderabad,  209  ;  battle  of,  210. 


I. 

brahim  Pasha,  206. 

ndia,  167,  255-258,  311-314. 


448 


INDEX. 


Inglis,  General  Sir  J.,  281,  298-300. 

Inverness,  Duchess  of,  43. 

Ionian  Isles,  397,  398. 

Ireland,  74-77,  218-220;   Young,  164, 

165,  222. 

Irish  Church,  405. 
Irish  Parliament,  74. 
Irish  Rebellion,  161,  166. 


J- 


Jackson,  General  Andrew,  137,  320. 
Janin,  Jules,  quoted,  239. 
Jellalabad,i74,  177, 183,  184,  188-190. 
Jenkyns,  379,  380. 
Jennings,  262,  263. 
Jingoism,  364. 

John  Company.     See  East  India  Co. 
Jubilee,  George  III.'s,  412,  413. 
Jubilee,  Queen    Victoria's,    414-416, 
441. 


K. 

Kavanagh,  Charles  Henry,  306,  317. 
Kaye,  Sir  J.  W.,  quoted,  188. 
Keate,  Dr.,  389,  390. 
Kent,     Edward,     Duke    of,    38-40 ; 
Duchess  of,  40,  41,  130,    170,   334, 

335i  336- 

Khyber  Pass,  171,  181-183. 
Kinglake,  400. 
Kingsley,  Charles,  334. 
Knapp,  Rev,  Mr.,  389. 
Koh-i-noor,  170. 
Kol6mine,  Madame,  440. 
Konieh,  battle  of,  206. 


Lablache,  156. 

Lamartine,  222. 

Lamb,  Lady  Caroline,  131,  132. 

Lawrence,  Sir  George  St.  Patrick,  182, 

186,  264,  267. 
Lawrence,  Sir  Henry,  264,  265,  273- 

275,  277-282,  289,  303,  305.  311. 
Lawrence,  John,  Lord,  262,  264,  265, 

290,291,  304,  311,  312. 


Lawrence,  Sir  Thomas,  70,  71. 
Leopold,  King  of  the  Belgians,  40, 68, 

69,  71,  72. 

Leopold,  Prince.     See  Albany. 
Letters,  153,  154. 
Lever,  Charles,  76. 
Lincoln,  Abraham,  339. 
Lincoln,  Lord,  393-395. 
Londonderry,  Marquis  of.   See  Castle- 

reagh. 

Longfellow,  H.  W.,  249. 
Lome,  Marquis  of,  437  ;  Marchioness. 

See  Louise. 
Louis.  Grand  Duke  of  Darmstadt,  328, 

329,  332.  337,  4°°>  44°,  441- 
Louis  Philippe,  72,  217,  239. 
Louise,     Duchess    of     Saxe-Coburg- 

Gotha,  147. 

Louise,  Princess,  395,  437,  438. 
Louise.  Queen  of  the  Belgians,  72,  239. 
Lowell,  Rev.  R.,  314-316. 
Lucknow,  273-275,  298-308,  311,  314- 

316. 
Lugershall,  85,  90,  99. 


M. 

Macaulay,  Lord,  98,  167,  255,  285. 
McCarthy,    Justin,  quoted,   124,  164, 

192,  225,  239,  320, 
McKenzie,  Captain  Colin,  182,  194- 

198. 

Mackenzie,  Dr.,  426. 
Macnaughten,  Sir  William,  174,  177- 

179;    Lady,  182,  184,  185. 
Macpelah,  cave  of,  429. 
Maginn,  Dr.,  Homeric  Ballads,  399. 
Malmesbury,  Lord,  35,  54-56. 
Mandarin,  236,  237. 
Manning,  Cardinal,  388,  393. 
Maranee,  212,  215,  216. 
Martineau,  Miss  H.,  143,  144. 
Mary,  Duchess  of  Gloucester,  35. 
Mary,  Landgravine  of  Homburg,  34. 
Mary,  Duchess  of  Teck,  415. 
May,  Duchess  of  York,  432. 
Maynooth,  396. 
Mayo,  Lord,  375,  377. 
Maximilian,  336. 
Maxwell,  Sir  W.  Stirling,  131. 
Meanee,  209,  210. 


INDEX. 


449 


Meerut,  261,  262. 

Mehemet  All,  206, 

Meiwand,  384. 

Melbourne,  Lord,  124,   131,  132,  137, 

157,  158,  159- 
Mensdorff,  Count,  148. 
Merivale,  Dean,  264. 
Mirza  Baboo,  185-187. 
Mohamider,  276,  277. 
Mohammed  Akbar,  187. 
Mohammed  Badahen.     See  Delhi. 
Monster  petitions,   (1839),  222,    223; 

(1848),  223-226. 
Monthly  Packet,  quoted^  142,  143,  414, 

415,  416. 

Moodkee,  213,  214. 
Moore,  Thomas,  46,  47. 
Murray,  Lady  Augusta,  42-44. 

N. 

Nana  Sahib,  278,  279,  284,  285,  289, 

290. 

Napier,  Admiral  Sir  Charles,  206. 
Napier,  General  Sir  Charles,  208-210, 

215,  216. 
Napiers,  24. 
Napoleon  I.,  24,  31,  32,  96,  170,  171, 

249. 

Napoleon  III.,  317-320,  357. 
Neill,  General,  301,  302. 
Newcastle,  Duke  of,  394,  395. 
Nicholson,  Colonel,  291. 
Northbrooke,  Lord,  377,  380. 
Norton,  Mrs.  Caroline,  131. 
Nott,  General,  190,  207. 

.       O. 

O'Brien,  222. 

O'Connell,  Daniel,  128,  159-166,  349, 

35°- 

O'Connor,  Feargus,  222-226. 
Oliphant,  Mrs.,  quoted,  22. 
Opium,  192. 
Orange,  Prince  of,  65. 
Orleans,  Duke  of,  17,  47. 
Orsini,  Felice,  318,  319,  357. 
Outlook,  quoted^  371,  372. 
Outram,  Sir  James,  209,  282,298,  302, 

303,  310,  311. 
Oxford,  57. 


P. 

Pacifico,  Don,  239,  240. 

Palmerston,  Lord,  171,  172,  218,  238, 

239.    24°,   254,   255,   320-322,   340, 

344-346,  360. 

Parliament,  101,  108,  114,  343-346. 
Paxton,  Sir  Joseph,  232. 
Peel,  Captain  W.,  R.  N.,  283, 298, 303. 
Peel,  Sir  Robert,  138,   158,  160,  161, 

200,  203-206,  218,  238-254,  351. 
Personal  and  family  recollections,  24, 

33-37,  42,  57-6°,  87,89,  94-97,  101, 

102,    114,   115,  125,  126,  129,  130, 

137,  139.  14°,   H1,  '59,  J63,  205, 

206,  245,  255,  268. 
Peshawar,  188. 
Phipps,    Sir    Charles,   323-325,    330, 

33'- 

Pitt,  53,  77,  So. 

Poerio,  Carlo,  396. 

Pollock,  Geneial,  187,  190,  207. 

Ponsonby,  Lord,  83,  84. 

Portland,  Duke  of,  13 

Postage,  12,  13,  179,  182,  194,  221, 
222. 

Potatoes,  218. 

Pottinger,  Eldred,  182. 

Primrose  League,  370-372. 

Prussia,  King  Frederick  William  of, 
231.  Crown-Princess  of,  324,  326, 
333.  336,  337,  417-427;  Crown- 
Prince,  423-427. 

Punch,  164,  230,  347. 


Q 

Queen  Victoria  :  her  birth.  39  ;  her 
childhood,  40;  her  accession,  124- 
126;  her  first  Council,  126-128;  her 
first  minister,  135-139,  157;  her* 
coronation,  139-144  ;  her  marriage, 
154,  153;  her  daily  life,  155,  156; 
the  Great  Exhibition,  227-237  ;  her 
note  on  the  Proclamation  to  the 
people  of  India,  313  ;  her  gratitude 
at  the  Prince  Consort's  escape  from 
danger,  330,  331  ;  her  mother's 
death-bed.  335-336  ;  her  husband's 
death-bed,  339-342  ;  her  children, 


29 


450 


INDEX. 


4i6-44i ;    her  widowhood,  345,  413, 
414;  her  jubilee,  414-416. 

Queenstown,  418. 

Quetta,  386. 


R. 

Railroad  fever,  220,  221 

Railroads  in  England,  91-93  ;  Balti- 
more and  Ohio.  92. 

Rajahpootra,  267. 

Reform  Bill,  94-105  ,  subsequent 
reform  bills,  203,  346,  358. 

Resolute,  321-323. 

Roberts,  General  Sir  Frederick,  382- 

384- 

Rogers,  Samuel,  349. 
Rotten  boroughs,  98,  99. 
Royal  Marriage  Act,  42. 
Runjeet  Singh,  170,  210. 
Rush,  Benjamin,  34. 
Russell,   Lord  John    (Earl  Russell), 

104,  105,  249,  346. 
Russia,  168,  170,  171,  254,  255,  363, 

372,  373- 


S. 


Sale,  Lady,  182, 184, 188, 189,  192,  193. 
Sale,  Sir  Robert,  183,  184,   187,  189, 

"3- 

Scinde,  207,  210. 

Scott,  Sir    Walter,   60-62,    334,    339, 

34°,  349.  35°.  4'8,  4^- 
Sepoys,  168,  210,  259,  266,  300,  301. 
Shah  Soojah,  170-174,  177,  178,  190. 
Shaftesbury,  Lord.     See  Ashley. 
Shere  Ali,  373-379. 
Sibthorp,  Colonel,  230,  231. 
Sikhs,  211,  213-216,  263,  264,  307. 
•Sikh  wars,  (i)  212-215  ;  (2)  216. 
Skobeleff,  General,  361,  363,  374,  377, 

378. 

Smith,  General  Baird,  292. 
Smith,  Goldwin,  quoted,  245,  246. 
Smith,   Rev.  Sydney,   quoted,   14-16, 

'»•  133- 
Sobraon,  215. 

Somnauth,  gates  of,  191,  193,  194. 
Sophia,  Princess,  35. 


Soult,  Marshal,  140,  141. 

South  ey,  18. 

Spencer,  Earl.     See  Althorp. 

Stanley  Dean,  429. 

Stockmar,  Baron,   159,  231,   249-253, 

335- 

Stoddart,  198,  199. 
Suez  Canal,  360. 
Sully,  212,  215. 
Sussex,  Augustus  Frederick,  Duke  of, 

42.  43>  44 


T. 

Tamerlane,  137. 

Tancred,  359. 

Tantia  Topi,  290. 

Taylor,  Alec,  292. 

Taylor,  Sir  Henry,  quoted,  400. 

Taxes,  14,  15. 

Teck,  Duchess  of,  415. 

Tennyson,   Lord,   155,  231,  249,  285, 

300,  301,  314,  324,  325,  368. 
Thackeray,  W.  M.,  45,  232,  238. 
Thugs,  258. 
Tichborne,  402-404. 
Tone,  Wolfe,  76. 

Treaty  of  London,  85  ;  of  Paris,  364. 
Trent,  337,  338. 
Turkish  war,  361,  363. 


Victoria.    See  Queen  Victoria 
Vienna,  Congress  of,  2. 
Vilhers,  203. 
Volunteers,  321 


W 

Wales,  Albert  Edward,  Prince  of.  158, 
327,  328,  336.  427-432 :  Princess 
of,  429-431  ;  their  children,  432. 

Walewski,  Count,  248. 

Waterloo.  87.  88. 

Wellington,  Duke  of,  85,  86,  89.  90, 
92,93,99,  136,  137,  140,  141,  167, 
171,  172,  174,  180,  191,  193,  200, 
216,  224,  226,  237,  240,  246-249, 
357- 


INDEX 


451 


Wetherell,  Sir  Charles,  106. 
Wheeler,   Sir    Hugh,    267,  278,   279, 

284-286. 
Whitbread,  80. 
Wilkie,  Sir  David,  129. 
William  IV'.,  40,  63,  102-104,  126. 
William,  Emperor,  328. 
William  II.,  Emperor,  231,  233,  246- 

249i  427J432- 

Willoughby,  Lieutenant,  263. 
Wilson,  General,  291,  292,  295 
Wmdham.  General,  309. 
Wolff,  Joseph,  199. 


Women,    compassionate    to    English 

fugitives,  277,  287. 
Wurtemberg,    King   of,    30,    31,    32 ; 

Queen  of,  30,  31,  32. 


Y. 

Yakoob  Khan,  377,  378,  380-382. 
Yonge,  Miss  Charlotte,  105,  141,  142. 
York,  Frederick,  Duke  of,  36,  37,  52. 

85-87. 
York,  George,  Duke  of,  432. 


A     000  056  491     4 


